


Reunification

by mylordshesacactus



Category: World of Warcraft
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Arranged Marriage, Enemies to Lovers, F/F, Gen, RIP to battle for azeroth but I'm different, Slow Burn, if Blizzard told me to write an expansion that sucked old god ass I would simply say no thank you, political maneuvering
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-09-26
Updated: 2020-03-26
Packaged: 2020-10-28 23:15:10
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 13
Words: 52,709
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20786648
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mylordshesacactus/pseuds/mylordshesacactus
Summary: Darnassus falls.In some timeline, in some version of the story, Nathanos Marris makes a mistake. In some timeline a word of kindness somewhere, a show of support somewhere else, a moment of humanity for lack of a better term, heads off a preemptive strike at the pass. In some timeline, Alliance intelligence is just a tiny bit more paranoid, a tiny bit more thorough, and the Horde stalls in Ashenvale.But today, Darnassus falls.Darnassus does not burn.





	1. Occupation

**Author's Note:**

> I am honestly shocked that "Okay, but what if Sylvanas' original plan--to seize and occupy Teldrassil--had succeeded?" isn't, like, the single most popular AU concept in the fandom right now. The idea got in my head and here we are! I swear to god, I've been working on this for like a week already and the timing has nothing to do with Certain Recent Cinematics.
> 
> Chapter 2 will be posted fairly soon on the heels of this one (think a few days, hopefully) in order to set up the AU; after that, updates will be more sporadic. I hope y'all will join me on this ride!

Smoke and the sharp tang of blood drifted over Teldrassil.

Darkshore burned; Ashenvale was a ruin. Oh, in time it was very possible the kaldorei might restore it; Sylvanas intended to let them, assisted by the Tauren if only to quiet Baine’s hand-wringing. It was neither sentiment nor mercy, but cold practicality—the Horde needed lumber. Lumber could not be acquired from a strip-mined wasteland. Garrosh had been a fool, and Sylvanas Windrunner would not make his mistakes. 

What good was ten years of plenty, only to be left with nothing at the end of it? Ashenvale would be tended, and carefully. With less reverence than the Night Elves had shown, of course—but sustainably. Their willingness to assist the Horde in planning its future use of the region was all but guaranteed, given the alternative.

The thought of dealing that closely with the insufferable self-righteous tree-hugging of the Kaldorei was already giving her a headache.  _ The sacrifices I make for my people _ .

Yes, the land would survive—but Ashenvale would never be the same.

Especially now that the Night Elves had lost their archdruid.

It would be a lie to say Darnassus was silent, as Horde soldiers filed in through the portal tree. Two abreast, heavily armed, wordless and marching in sync, their thundering steps felt wrong somehow in the once-tranquil air of Teldrassil.

Teldrassil would adapt.

The screaming had stopped, at least—mostly. There were still pockets of melodramatic wailing, of course. Saurfang had expressed the opinion that Sylvanas, who had seen her own city brought to its knees once, should have more sympathy for the defeated.

Sylvanas had seen her city’s defenses breached by hostile forces  _ twice, _ she had reminded him none too gently. He flinched from the mention of Undercity, and she made no attempt to hide her disgust. She respected Saurfang’s experience—she did not have to tolerate his  _ squeamishness.  _ She had no doubt he would prefer to forget, as much as was possible, that the one he called Warchief counted a festering den of Blight and rotting corpses as her capital.

Had he been anyone else, he would have earned far more than a baring of teeth for daring to mention  _ Silvermoon. _ Sylvanas knew very well what the fall of a capital city  _ could _ entail. Her sympathy for the Night Elves’ dramatics over an  _ occupation _ was nonexistent.

Most of the hysterics had died down. It was a pleasant surprise, in truth. Sylvanas had anticipated their increasing, not fading, when she mounted the head of Malfurion Stormrage over the Temple of the Moon.

But their grief was now too great for wailing. The survivors seemed stunned, quiet in their despair. Capitulation had been certain, once their last and greatest hope was dashed. They could have held Teldrassil, at least a little longer; the Sentinels did not need Stormrage to be deadly in the shadows of the forest. But the Kaldorei were not the only ones with druids, and Sylvanas had rangers of her own. 

Whisperwind had barely managed to send word through the portal granting the defenders her blessing to surrender, before Horde rogues finally broke through to slay the mages.

The city had been at best a day from falling entirely; the tree would follow. The Sentinels were not fools. They would sell themselves dearly to the last, lost cause notwithstanding; Sylvanas was aware that her spite toward them for that courage was, at best, irrational. But with the conquering of Darnassus a certainty, their deaths no longer served a purpose except to further traumatize their people and decrease what little bargaining power they still held in negotiations. It had taken hours only, once Stormrage died, to secure Darnassus. 

She would keep her word to the old general. This would be  _ honorable, _ in all ways but the lack of a formal declaration of war. It  _ had _ to be. No harm would befall noncombatants. There would be no looting, and no destruction within the city. Kaldorei and Worgen wounded who had heeded the call to surrender were already in the care of Horde shamans—they were wary and resentful, but they would have no complaints about their treatment. The restrictions she intended to place on the Kaldorei within their tree would be…reasonable.

“Reasonable” was subjective. Sylvanas had enough self-awareness to acknowledge that she was going to need to leave most of that particular judgement call to Saurfang. 

_ Most _ of it. The guilt complex he’d conveniently decided to develop  _ now _ of all times would not be allowed to compromise the occupation.

Sylvanas stood dark and silent on the roof of the Temple, watching as the Horde army moved into Darnassus. Mages, shamans and archers perched in the trees and on the roofs of what passed for buildings here; soldiers on war wolves or sharp-eyed raptors fanned out among the roots and between buildings as what few civilians had not retreated within their own dwellings cringed out of their way. 

At the central pavilion dull-eyed Sentinels, ears stiff with pain and the occasional erratic twitch betraying their inner turmoil, carefully lay down their weapons under the watchful eyes of the best of Sylvanas’ Dark Rangers. They had been separated from their sabercats, which were safely in the hands of Horde hunters and stablemasters. In time, they would be given access to the beasts again, if only to reduce the strain on Sylvanas’ own people—but not yet. 

Nathanos had wanted to oversee that final surrender. Sylvanas had instead placed him in charge of coordinating the loci of Horde power as they established themselves here. Nathanos’ skills were unparalleled, his loyalty unquestionable, and his categorical inability to hold his tongue in the face of Sylvanas’ enemies well-established.

The last thing they needed, with their hold so nearly guaranteed, was a  _ riot _ .

As if summoned by the thought, there was a bang and a flash of light from within the temple.

The main clearing went deathly still. A Sentinel glanced seemingly on reflex toward the pile of surrendered weapons. Sylvanas barely had time to narrow her eyes before she felt Alina through the Ranger bond, clearing her throat. The Sentinel looked away again, almost but not quite flinching from the pointed correction—like a high-spirited charger, responding to a mere twitch of the whip.

In the space of that brief distraction, Nathanos had appeared at her side. He spared barely a glance for Stormrage’s head as he spoke. 

“My Lady,” he said, quietly, for Sylvanas’ ears alone. “The forces sent to secure the priestesses have encountered some resistance.”

Another, brighter flash of moonlight, this time accompanied by a gutteral orcish scream.

Nathanos paused.

“Reasonably noteworthy resistance,” he clarified.

“Then  _ stifle it,” _ she hissed, scanning the crowd. Restless whispers were beginning to spread; worse, the Horde armies were reacting to the unrest. Minor signs, for now—tense grips on weapons, just a hint of shifting in place. But that would boil over, and quickly. This had to be resolved.

Sylvanas dropped to ground level, waving off a hasty salute by the elite guard posted at the entrance. The temple’s interior was almost disgustingly serene, all flowing water and overgrown plant life as if the Kaldorei had taken a moral objection to the concept of  _ flooring _ as well as magic. Sylvanas paid the delicate stonework no mind; Saurfang stood just inside the doorway, frowning and rubbing his chin.

“Speak,” she ordered sharply.

The High Overlord didn’t get the chance before he was interrupted. Bleeding and favoring a bandaged left arm, the ash streaks on the Sentinel’s face marked her as a recent survivor of Darkshore. Her presence here marked her as that battle’s commanding officer—or at least, the highest-ranking officer left.

“Warchief,” she said, taking half a step forward before one of the orcish warriors flanking her placed a warning hand on her shoulder. She shrugged the touch off, but made no further attempt to approach Sylvanas. Her glowing eyes were desperate, nearly frantic. “Our surrender  _ is _ legitimate, I swear to you—” 

“Your oaths appear to be worth less than I had originally assumed,” Sylvanas pointed out. “You agreed that there would be no further official resistance.” Desperate, unofficial holdouts were inevitable; but the Sentinels had sent druids and unarmed riders ahead, to warn Teldrassil of the fall of their capital. Even most of those isolated pockets of resistance would, however they resented the Sentinels’ surrender, be intelligent enough to understand that there was no point in fighting if no help would ever come.

The few priestesses without the sense to flee the Temple of the Moon would, of course, lack the sense to know when a fight was futile.

“We  _ did _ tell them the city has surrendered,” the Sentinel insisted. “I had every reason to believe…”

“I am to understand they act against your orders, then?” Sylvanas let her shoulders relax, just slightly. Desperate people did stupid things, and the situation was enough of a powder keg already. If the secular authorities believed she was about to use this little rebellion as an excuse to start some form of mass slaughter...she wanted a hostage city, not a river of blood.

_ “No one _ can—” The Sentinel visibly calmed herself, though her ears were still pinned back like a fighting stallion. “Warchief, there  _ is _ no authority that can countermand a priestess of Elune, not in this. Tyrande Whisperwind herself doesn’t have that right! If they believe themselves to be acting in accordance with the wishes of the Goddess—” 

“Spare me.” One way or another, this needed to be addressed—now. A quick, harsh burst of violence that gave the populace only minutes to think about what was happening was far preferable to a long engagement. “They were given the opportunity to surrender. If they’re so desperate to die, allow me to permit them.”

Saurfang looked pained.

“If you object to their deaths, High Overlord,” Sylvanas informed him smoothly, “Those deaths can always be made  _ temporary.” _

She didn’t bother to hide her sneer at their open disgust over that possibility. After so many years, you would think they’d have gotten used to the idea. Or at least learned  _ manners _ .

Sylvanas considered the situation for a brief moment, then snapped her fingers at the Sentinel and turned on her heel, stalking back out into the main clearing with an increasingly nervous night elf having to jog to catch up to her.

The crowd looked up when they emerged, tense, ready to snap at any moment. Sylvanas pinned them in place with her eyes, just for a moment, before turning to the Sentinel.

“Collect four volunteers.” There was just enough of the Banshee in her words, letting them carry unnaturally across the frozen square. “Sentinels, druids,  _ civilians, _ I care not. Talk the priestesses down. Subdue them if you must. You have  _ one hour _ before I end this myself.”

Abject relief broke across the Sentinel’s face. “Thank you. They believe they have no choice, if we can only—”

“One hour from  _ now,” _ Sylvanas said pointedly. “I suggest you waste no more of my time.”

The woman rushed off, rattling off a few names and pointing to one specific young man in the crowd. Sylvanas watched them, suspicious; but five night elves would not make much difference, if she had to take the priestesses of Elune by force..

Blood pouring down the steps of the Temple of the Moon would be...a striking image, to say the least. All that pristine white marble...

But perhaps  _ too _ striking an image, in a city that had already surrendered. Let the Alliance see that she could be  _ reasonable. _ Let them think what  _ might  _ have been—what could still be, should Lordaeron be threatened.

With a gesture, Nathanos was back at her side. She didn’t wait for him to speak. “Champion. How soon can we move to secure the barrow dens?”

“Not sooner than six hours, my lady,” he replied. “But no later. Our losses in Ashenvale and Darkshore were steep; we risk overextending and losing our grip on Darnassus. Especially near the Howling Oak. Greymane’s dogs are being...difficult.”

“Mmm.” Shocking information, really.

Nathanos hesitated. Delicately, he suggested, “If we were to receive...reinforcements, Dark Lady. An infusion of soldiers, say from just across the strait…”

Sylvanas gave a dark laugh. “Soon, my champion. Not yet. These Kaldorei and their druidic sensibilities...in time, they will join the Forsaken as well. For the moment, my priority is avoiding a mass panic.” She considered. “Pull our people away from the Howling Oak. Send in...tauren, perhaps. Sin’dorei. Orcs and Darkspear if we need the numbers. The Worgen despise the Forsaken past reason; they may surrender more easily to the living. Our pride can be swallowed—for now. Patience. The dogs will be housebroken eventually.”

Nathanos gave a single huff of amusement. “As you command.”

* * *

Time passed.

* * *

The Alliance made noise, of course.

Sylvanas had hardly expected them to be happy about the situation. But they could make nothing  _ besides _ noise. Stormwind was becoming less multicultural and more a second Council of Three Hammers by the day; the existence of Gilneas had been a polite fiction for years, and being cut off from Teldrassil only made its tenuous grip on life more fragile. Whisperwind had, of course, evacuated to Stormwind; with nowhere else to go, she and the surviving Kaldorei were stuck there for the foreseeable immediate future.

There were options, of course, though not good ones. Night elves did poorly in plains and deserts, which ruled out the vast majority of Alliance lands; it would take more than being forced to flee their capital city before it was conquered by force to make any sane creature relocate to Northrend.

Sylvanas wondered if Whisperwind would get desperate enough to try Val’sharah. With Highmountain on one side and Suramar on the other, it would be a foolish venture; but Sylvanas would allow a settlement, if they ever tried it. 

Saurfang had seemed surprised when she mentioned that. He still lacked vision. If the Kaldorei began to relocate, built a new capital, a new base of operations, that meant the Horde had won. It would mean that even Tyrande Whisperwind had begun to view the occupation of Teldrassil as something permanent.

She did not anticipate that a new settlement would be in the works any time soon.

Sylvanas had waited a month, after securing Darnassus, to allow the dust to settle. Then, without fanfare, without a formal announcement, the Forsaken had begun to retake the city of Lordaeron in earnest.

The Alliance made noise about that as well—but it was a ragged, disjointed cry, no longer a clarion call.

Now hosting nearly all the displaced refugees of two separate sovereign nations—three counting the Exodar evacuees, very technically four whenever Proudmoore chose to grace the city with her presence—Stormwind was stretched to its limit. The boy king was, depending on who you asked, either “generous and noble” or “too polite to ask Genn Greymane to please get out of his house”. Wrynn was desperately trying to arrange housing and food for nearly three times the citizens for whom he was meant to be responsible; there were no resources to waste on an army. How could he justify outfitting troops to send North, when the same gold and supply lines could be flowing  _ into _ the city?

All to stop Sylvanas’ people from moving back into, in many cases, their own homes. The ranks of the Forsaken almost overwhelmingly consisted of former Lordaeron citizens. They had paid  _ taxes. _

Arthas had inconveniently timed his rampage on just after the first of the month, to boot. Sylvanas knew at least six different Forsaken who had kept themselves mostly sane entirely via indignation over damn well having paid rent on the place only to have the Alliance ban them from the city without even giving them their security deposit back.

The Forsaken were a strange people. But they were  _ hers. _

Greymane howled the loudest, of course, but there was nothing he could do; and even the old wolf deferred his fury in the face of Whisperwind’s. Even Sylvanas could find nothing to fault in his loyalty to the Kaldorei.

She had not counted on that. Thus far, the unexpected unity between Greymane and Whisperwind was cause only for concern, not alarm. The High Priestess wanted Darnassus liberated, and the expected pushback from Greymane—fury at the idea of freeing Teldrassil when Gilneans had lived in exile for years—had not come. If anything, he was a fiercer warhawk on behalf of the Night Elves than anyone.

It was almost  _ sweet. _ Gilneas, for once, was looking to something other than its own house. Sylvanas would almost have been  _ proud  _ of them if they weren’t actively ruining her carefully-set plans, and if her warmest fantasies didn’t universally involve white wolfskin rugs.

That might become a problem. Genn Greymane’s voice in Anduin’s ear was dangerous enough when he had only hatred driving him, rather than love.

But Tyrande Whisperwind, at least, seemed to understand the imminent crisis. In deference to her judgement Greymane’s people were beginning to disperse to lessen the strain, moving to where they might do more good. Stormwind, faced with starvation over the next several years, seemed to have suddenly remembered that Westfall existed and Greymane seemed eager to send worgen into the area en masse, revitalizing the farming communities.

_ That  _ travesty of statesmanship would certainly keep the young lion occupied, if it didn’t kill him outright.

Eventually, they would realize the implications of moving on Lordaeron while the Horde had its iron-clad boot pressed against Teldrassil’s throat. In the meantime, Sylvanas was perfectly happy to let the ants swarm about in confusion.

Time passed. Tense, resentful months, with bursts of violence and a few Darnassian uprisings; too many people were too familiar with the young World Tree to ever completely lock it down, even with wards up to prevent teleportation.

Even Saurfang’s strategy for keeping, say, Jaina Proudmoore away from the occupation had been a weary shrug and the sage advice to hope that Jaina Proudmoore stayed away of her own volition. Sylvanas had glared at him and set up a few more incendiary charges around Teldrassil. Someday, when the Alliance found its feet again, that security would be essential.

She had also arranged the anonymous delivery of several long, rare, and extremely boring books in Proudmoore’s name to Stormwind Keep. If Sylvanas had been forced to waste hours and hours of the few years of her life that remained listening to Kael’thas and his skin-crawling lust toward his student, she was damn well going to use that information for a possible tactical advantage. The  _ second  _ thing she had learned from Kael was that bribery was usually worth a try.

(The third had been that princes were incapable of speech while eating expensive chocolates. All of these lessons had been exploited with ruthless efficiency as part of her sanity’s desperate self-preservation campaign.)

The door opened. Sylvanas glanced up.

Velonara faltered on the threshold, and Sylvanas hissed in irritation. She knew better than to let her thoughts dip into memories of her time among the living. She knew what that kind of rumination did to her mood, and her Dark Rangers had clearly learned it as well.

She forced her shoulders and ears to relax. “Velonara. Speak.”

Visibly relaxing, Velonara stepped inside the Hold, trailing Saurfang.

She took Sylvanas at her word, handing over a sealed envelope. “The Alliance wants to negotiate, on the subject of Darnassus.”

Sylvanas’ eyes narrowed slightly.  _ “Who _ wishes to negotiate?”

“The Alliance, as a whole.” Saurfang looked unhappy; of course he did. He alone understood the real end goal. Nathanos, the only other soul Sylvanas would have been willing to lay her full plan before, hadn’t asked. His Lady commanded; that was enough.

Sylvanas considered this.

“Leave us,” she told the Ranger. Velonara bowed and retreated. As soon as they were alone, Sylvanas turned to regard the High Overlord.

“The purpose of invading Darnassus,” she mused, “was to drive a wedge through the Alliance. A wound that could never heal.”

Saurfang grunted, thoughtful. “That they negotiate as a unified front is not a good sign,” he allowed. “But it may be only that—a front.”

Sylvanas allowed that possibility with a gesture. “Some ties in their leadership run deep, this is true enough. As it happens, the fact that it has taken nearly four months for them to arrange negotiations indicates that they are not as united as they believe. Even if the wound does not yet bleed...this is only a first move. If we handle it properly, we can pry open that divide even further.”

The old soldier nodded, frowning as he stared at nothing. “Do you intend to negotiate?”

“At the moment?” Sylvanas was still turning options over in her head. When she answered, it was careful. “I am inclined to refuse, at least a little longer. Allowing negotiations so early undermines our goal of allowing the Alliance to stew in their own divisions. They pull together now, certainly; but how long will it last, if we refuse to allow them a simple solution as a whole unit?”

Saurfang hummed, but not in agreement. “If you will take my advice, Warchief.”

“Of course.”

“You said you wished this to be an honorable war,” he said. Sylvanas’ eyes narrowed slightly at the opener, less from the words than from the faint thread of defiance running through them. “To refuse negotiation altogether cedes too much to the Alliance. You already know you will agree to nothing that does not benefit the Horde; show both the Alliance and your own people that you are capable of proceeding honestly. That there was a  _ purpose  _ to that slaughter.”

Sylvanas nodded slowly. “You believe that turning down this request entirely will be seen not as a move in the game, but as refusing to play at all. Or worse, as a forfeit.”

“You would be surrendering the initiative, yes, and providing a clear and common enemy. But beyond that, Warchief—if you wish to be seen as reasonable, you must show that you are open to reasonable requests. Asking to speak about your intentions is not asking too much.”

Sylvanas considered this before giving a small nod. “In this, I believe you are correct. We will speak with the Alliance; refusing talks may well allow them to view the Horde as the sole source of conflict between them, driving them closer together. We will play the game, then, and pry the gaps apart where they can be found.”

That did not seem to be exactly what Saurfang had meant; but he nodded anyway. Sylvanas considered confronting him for that reticence; he had bought into this plan, worked it to its conclusion. He had been as ruthlessly creative, as eager for the fight, as she was. He had been in awe of the plan. It had been his blow that killed Stormrage. Using her as a villain to avoid his own culpability was going to get old fast.

But this didn’t actually seem like his guilt complex, only differing priorities. For now, she let it go.

Besides; she was in a good mood.

“After all,” she said with a smile, tapping her finger on the sealed missive. _ “So _ many things are said around a negotiating table.”


	2. Negotiation I

The tactful thing would have been to arrange for negotiations in a neutral location.

The lack of genuinely neutral locations on Azeroth notwithstanding—the young king had tried to suggest Dalaran, and a silent, pointed glance at Proudmoore over his shoulder had been enough to make them _ both _flush—Sylvanas was not inclined to do the tactful thing.

The Horde unequivocally held the upper hand. Wrynn and his loyal puppies could call this a _ negotiation _ all they liked; the Alliance had nothing with which to bargain, and very little they could make in the way of threats. Sylvanas knew _ that _ with certainty—exhaustive sessions with Saurfang had established it beyond doubt. If either had not been true, moving on Darnassus would have been foolish.

These were not wartime negotiations. This was the Alliance attempting to make a petition; the Warchief would hear them, but she had no obligation to make any concessions to their comfort.

So the Alliance delegation was uncomfortable in Bilgewater Harbor. What were they going to do—refuse the meeting? 

No. They would come to _ her, _ for once. It would be good for them. A little humility had yet to kill anyone Sylvanas particularly missed.

She glanced at a chronometer, hanging crooked on a gilded wall—Gallywix could always be counted on for luxury, even if his insistence on referring to hosting this meeting as a “favor” and not his duty as a vassal of the Horde grated. There was power in being the first to a location, forcing the enemy to enter your territory. Bilgewater, however, was already Horde territory (Sylvanas wouldn’t _ quite _ be willing to face the endless dark before claiming a square inch of this greasy pit as her own, but it was a close thing), and there was also power in making the other party wait.

Fifteen minutes was long enough. She pushed off the wall, took her time adjusting weapons and pauldrons to look the part, and squared her shoulders before flicking an imperious glance at the Forsaken warrior waiting at the door.

The champion grinned; she had served long enough to know Sylvanas’ preferences, and well enough to be entitled to whatever level of familiarity she wished, in private. It was a momentary flash of the kind of connection Sylvanas’ people craved, before she gripped the handle and _ flung _ the door open—hard enough to ring like cannonfire off the metal panels in the hallway. A single hand held out with undead strength kept it from rebounding more than a few inches as Sylvanas stalked over the threshold.

The Horde leaders waiting in the antechamber, predictably, jumped. Sylvanas passed them without so much as a glance, and they scrambled to fall in at her heels; the orcish warriors at the other end of the hall straightened with a faintly panicked look as she descended on them, and belatedly seemed to realize that she wasn’t meant to have to stop and wait on their pleasure.

They managed to pull themselves together enough to unbar and open the doors just before she would have been forced to either slow down, or walk face-first into them.

She hid her satisfaction. Amateurish; but if they had failed she would have had to issue some form of correction. Having done it acceptably, these two were unlikely to nearly miss their cue again in the future.

The boy king had _ some _concept of what a power play looked like, at least. He had taken the head of the table, facing the door by which the Horde would enter. Sylvanas allowed it; within the hour, as the sun moved over the harbor, it would begin lancing directly into Wrynn’s delicate eyes. Sparkling off that pretty armor, of course; but she didn’t object to the imagery of the boy shining and golden while the angle of the windows threw her into shadow.

Nothing bright and pure remained so for long, not in this world. But darkness and shadows, corruption, death...those could never fully be sponged away, even by time.

Talks like this should have taken place in Orgrimmar, but that was clearly out of the question. Even if the Alliance had been willing to send their racial leaders into Sylvanas’ seat of power without security, Sylvanas had no intention of simply opening the gates to some of the most powerful individuals in the world. 

Greymane would _ love _to enter Orgrimmar without a fight. Proudmoore could do it herself and bring a small army on her heels, and too many of the Alliance were still loyal enough—out of pity, as many as not—to follow her. And then there was Whisperwind, whose restraint hung by thin twine strung over razor wire. Best not to give her any undue opportunities.

Not waiting for her people to find their seats, Sylvanas stormed through the doors, kicked her seat to the side, and dropped into it with an air of carelessness. Out of the corner of her eye she saw Greymane’s hackles very literally stand on end, and allowed herself a smirk.

The boy had assembled the Alliance in full, it seemed. As always, Greymane lurked at his shoulder, but today the wolf had deferred that closest position to Whisperwind. Gallywix, who had chosen to “greet” his “guests” rather than waiting with the rest of the Horde leaders, was lounging in his chair while two of the Council of Three Hammers physically restrained Gelbin Mekkatorque from leaping across the table—so goblin-gnome relations had apparently taken a turn for the better. Alleria was determinedly refusing to meet Sylvanas’ gaze.

And sitting at Alleria’s right was a well-muscled draenei—Lightforged, and familiar. Apparently the High Exarch was sending Fareeya in his place rather than sit at a negotiating table beside his wife. And wasn’t _ that _ interesting. 

“I thought I made myself clear,_ ” _ she drawled, filing that little piece of information away as the Horde leaders found their seats. Saurfang took one look at Tyrande Whisperwind’s face and hastily slammed on the brakes, sidling into the seat directly at Sylvanas’ right—which was where she wanted him, anyway. The unlucky position fell to Baine, who took his lumps with admirable calm. “Your delegation was to come unarmed. I allow _ you _Varian’s sword out of respect. I admired your father.”

Greymane, predictably, half-rose and gave a rippling snarl. “You have some gall, speaking of Varian’s legacy! If it weren’t for your treachery at the Broken Shore—” 

_ “I admired Vol’jin as well,” _ Sylvanas said sharply. She shot a hard glance down the table, allowing the Banshee into her voice. After a moment, she softened it to a deadly murmur. “Be careful whose orders you call _ treacherous _, old wolf.”

Baine stirred. “Vol’jin’s honor was beyond reproach,” he rumbled, and Sylvanas forced herself not to react. She was...unaccustomed, to support from that quarter. But Baine Bloodhoof seemed to be reacting honestly to her implication. “I was there as well; we were overrun.The late King Wrynn would have made the same call. You would do well to remember that it was not only the _ Alliance _ who lost a leader that day.”

“Indeed.” Sylvanas leaned back, kicking her heels up on the table. “And such _ accusations, _ against an honorable warrior. To turn against an ally, in the heat of battle, at the critical point in a war against such foes as the Burning Legion...that would be an unforgivable crime. Not an accusation to be made lightly. The betrayed party would have every right to demand a blood price. Wouldn’t you agree, _ Your Majesty? _”

Varian’s heir, praise be to the Sun, had at least inherited some of his father’s intelligence. While Greymane still bristled, Anduin suddenly looked acutely uncomfortable. So, _ someone _ in the Eastern Kingdoms remembered Stormheim after all. How interesting.

“We didn’t come here to argue about the past,” he said hastily. “Sylvanas, we _ are _ unarmed.”

“Fascinating. Allow me to admire your new walking stick, Proudmoore. It looks exceptionally like the staff of an archmage.”

“If I wanted to kill you,” Jaina Proudmoore said with icy dignity, “I wouldn’t need a staff to do it.”

“You would need a bronze dragon, if you wanted to beat your _ lover _to the kill,” Sylvanas observed, and moved on before a suddenly white-faced Jaina could collect her shocked indignation enough to actually set the building on fire. “Do tell me you had something of substance to discuss, King Wrynn, before your erstwhile subjects decided to run amuck?”

Anduin looked flustered. Good. “Allies, Sylvanas, not subjects; but yes. We have to talk about Darnassus. You can’t _ possibly _ expect—you’re not a fool, Warchief. You know the Alliance can’t simply _ accept _ such a blatant act of war!”

Sylvanas gave a tight, mirthless smile. “You speak as though the Alliance has a choice.”

Now it was Whisperwind’s turn to rise, bracing her hands on the table as she moved to stand and only restrained herself at the last moment. Her voice shook with emotion, primarily the emotion of killing rage. “You will _ not _ hold Teldrassil. My people are patient, and our knowledge of those forests was old before _any_ of your kind existed.”

Rokhan cleared his throat, unimpressed; Whisperwind barely seemed to notice him.

“It is only a matter of time,” she spat. “Our spirits are not so broken as you think. The Kaldorei will rise against you, and the stars will _ tremble _ at our fury.”

A few of the Horde leaders looked unnerved; Sylvanas simply examined her clawed gauntlets, radiating boredom.

“And I will detonate the Azerite stores I’ve placed throughout the World Tree, and _ then _ you can lecture me about the resilience of your people in the face of tragedy.” She glanced up. “Your knowledge of Ashenvale is impressive, certainly; it did not save you. But Teldrassil? You ought to play cards more often, High Priestess, if you intend to bluff. That tree is younger than _ Theramore _ , and you have battled the corruption at its heart since it was planted _ . _ You overestimate the advantage it gives you.”

Whisperwind’s eartips shook with anger. “You will _ pay for this,” _ she hissed.

“Tyrande,” murmured Anduin.

Sylvanas regarded him from the shadows of her hood. “Did you request this audience,” she asked archly, “Solely to _ lecture _me, young lion? Darnassus will remain under Horde control for as long as I see fit. You believe you have an offer to make. Make it.”

Anduin glanced at Whisperwind, anxiety writ large on his face. “Less an offer,” he said carefully. “More of a...proposition. But before we discuss it…” He shook his head, emotion breaking through the thin mask of a statesman he so desperately tried to wear. “Sylvanas..._why?_ After everything...the Horde and Alliance are stronger when we stand together. We’ve proven that time and time again—”

“A pretty story. I remember those times of _ unity _ very differently. Without an immediate, pressing threat to the existence of our world, little priest, we fall on one another. _With_ an immediate threat, we are unable to keep knives from each other’s backs. This too has happened too many times to ignore. I do not choose to wait until the next time. Always the Forsaken have suffered first; no longer. ” She allowed herself a smirk. “You ought to thank me—I offer the key to the peace you seek.”

Speaking for the first time, Velen shook his head. “This is not peace.”

“I never moved on Azuremyst,” Sylvanas pointed out, quiet. “Your people were no threat to mine. Our diplomats will be in touch, should Stormwind allow them anywhere near; the Draenei have suffered enough.”

Alas, Velen was too wise—or perhaps too paranoid—not to see through the attempt. “Mmm. The Alliance negotiates as a whole, Warchief, or not at all.”

Sylvanas raised an eyebrow and inclined her head before turning back to Anduin. Pretty words, and the Prophet meant them—for now. Six months of straining Stormwind’s resources to the breaking point would change their tune; eventually, the Alliance would broker peace where they could find it.

“As I say,” she declared, louder, reclaiming attention she had never truly lost. “There will be no war this time. I am not Garrosh Hellscream; I have no desire to conquer the world, only to secure a future for my people. _ This _ time, the peace will hold because you have no choice. For the sake of the Kaldorei, I hope I have not _ misjudged _ your vaunted Alliance righteousness.”

“Lordaeron,” Greymane snarled, “Belongs to the Alliance! We will _ never _ allow it to fall into _ Horde _ hands.”

Sylvanas bared her teeth, feeling shadows writhing at her back. _ “You surrendered its citizens willingly enough!” _

“Enough,” Anduin snapped. “_ Genn!” _ Greymane, who had been building up to bluster more, growled but subsided. The young king took a long breath, and sighed. “It was the claim on Lordaeron that we wanted to discuss, Warchief,” he said more reasonably. 

"Not Darnassus?" Sylvanas glanced at Whisperwind, who hadn’t reacted. “You surprise me, High Priestess. You tolerate this? Have the Night Elves fallen so low in the priorities of your precious Alliance?”

Whisperwind ignored her entirely.

Anduin held up a hand. “The issues are related. I...believe I may have a solution.”

Proudmoore, standing over his shoulder, muttered “You never mentioned it to _ me,” _ just loud enough for Sylvanas to pick up on.

“You inspired it, actually,” was the murmured response. “Don’t be angry, Jaina.”

Proudmoore looked as if she _ hadn’t _ been angry, but was now seriously considering it just on principle.

Sitting forward Anduin rested his interlaced hands on the table. “I’ve...come to a similar conclusion about the inevitability of violence,” he admitted. “Though my solution is somewhat different. Velen is right, Sylvanas. What good is a facsimile of peace, held in place by the threat of force? Someday Darnassus will rebel, or something else will go wrong. But Lordaeron...we have the chance to create something lasting. A real peace. If you’re truly willing to do the work to secure your people’s future…”

“Spit it out. Platitudes bore me, and I have a conquered city to run.”

“Joint administration,” Anduin said, voice low. He had mastered the earnest delivery; he could not quite master the tension in his shoulders, bracing for backlash from both sides.

There was a pregnant pause.

Lor’themar, delicately, broke the silence. “That sounds...unwise.”

“My king,” said Greymane, aghast. “After everything she’s done—!”

Proudmoore, with the confidence of that sweet faux-familial intimacy, was less diplomatic. 

“Anduin,” she demanded. “Are you_ insane?!_ _Cohabitation_ with the Horde? With _this _Horde? There will be rivers of blood in the streets within a day, and it will be on _all_ of our hands for allowing it!”

“You’re the expert, Lady Proudmoore,” Lor’themar said with a mildness that fooled no one.

Falstad Wildhammer tilted his head, thoughtful. “May not be as crazy as it sounds. ‘Tis not the worst method of wrestling peace in a powder keg. It worked in Ironforge, aye?”

Moira Thaurissan snorted, carefully lowering Mekkatorque to the ground by his collar. Satisfied that he was finished trying to murder Gallywix with his bare hands, she commented, “Aye, well, _ tha’s _ debatable. But I’ve heard worse plans up from Stormwind. I always said the damn Forsaken had the stronger claim, but there are Lordaeron _ survivors _as well. Would ye bar them from their homes the same way?”

“Yes,” Sylvanas answered flatly, the unnatural echo bouncing off the walls. “The living have no end of kingdoms eager to welcome them. Do you think me a fool?”

“I know you’re not.” Anduin placed his hands flat on the table, then winced and gingerly picked them up again when it registered exactly how sticky Gallywix’s table was. “You said yourself that you took Darnassus as collateral. A hostage, against the safety of Lordaeron. Of your people. With this plan, you wouldn’t _ need _ a hostage. The Alliance wouldn’t be able to move against Lordaeron without placing our own people in danger. Lift the occupation of Teldrassil! Maybe the reason the Horde and Alliance can’t work together is that we’ve never really tried. We’ve never really had a situation where both sides held an equal stake. It _ has _ to be worth trying. Anything is better than this.”

Red eyes burned into watery blue. For a long time, no one moved.

Finally, the ring of Sylvanas’ armored fingertips drumming on the table broke the silence. Bronzebeard actually jumped; Thalyssra’s left ear twitched badly in just as intense a tell. Sylvanas ignored them.

“Such an earnest proposal,” she said. “Shall I _ translate _ from the language of righteousness?”

Her voice was even; but most of those who hadn’t flinched before shrank back now, as the echoes in her voice redoubled. Alleria cringed harder than the rest, sending a petty spike of vicious satisfaction through Sylvanas’ core. It wasn’t enough to assuage her rising fury; shadows thrashed in the corners of the room as she stood, slowly, darkness coalescing around her.

_ “Darnassus has fallen!” _ Sylvanas informed the assembled leaders. “You lack the resources and the momentum to liberate it, and you know I do not bluff. You are unable to move on Lordaeron as you have always wanted. And so now, you come to me thinking that if you simply ask, I will open its gates to the Alliance after everything my people have suffered. You would have me allow an occupation of my city, stand down my forces in Darnassus...shall I tell you what you plan next, _Your Majesty_ _ ?” _

Anduin held a hand up, but the frantic look in his eyes belied the calming gesture. “Sylvanas, that’s not—”

“Shall I _ tell you _ what will happen, the moment the Alliance has a foothold in Lordaeron and the lives of every man, woman, and child in Teldrassil no longer hang in the balance? I ask again. _ Do you think me a fool?” _

Greymane bared white teeth, standing fully this time. “Our king,” he snarled, “is _ already _offering you more than you deserve, you filthy—”

_ “Enough!” _

There would be time in the future for both Anduin and Sylvanas to deal with the psychological trauma of having spoken in unison. For now Sylvanas was in a towering rage, and she didn’t care enough to pause.

“There will be no _ deal _ for the occupation of Lordaeron,” she hissed. “Get _ out. _ All of you! This farce is—”

_ “Adjourned!” _ Anduin leapt to his feet. “A recess, Sylvanas. I can be reasonable. An hour, and we can hear what you plan for Darnassus. Surely there are agreements we can reach about that, at least!”

She barely managed to stomp on the instinct to shout her refusal across the room; as it was, she pinned the young king in his seat with a glare before throwing the doors back open and storming out.

* * *

She’d brought Nathanos, of course, to watch her back; but Nathanos hadn’t lasted this long by being stupid, so he knew better than to bother Sylvanas when she was this angry.

Saurfang had less common sense than her champion. Nevertheless, the old soldier was not stupid either; duty might drive him to annoy her, but he edged well inside comfortable shooting range before clearing his throat.

“High Overlord,” she greeted him coldly.

“Warchief.”

She didn’t bother looking at him, staring out over Bilgewater. The filthy air here burned even her undead lungs; how the goblins could bear it, she had no idea. She only hoped it was making Whisperwind even more miserable. If Sylvanas had to spend more than an hour in this place, she was going to do something foolish like finally give in to Baine’s repeated petitions and start enforcing pollution regulations.

Her reputation would never survive.

Saurfang spoke again. “Do you intend to return to negotiations?”

Sylvanas’ smile was barely a twist of the lips. “I wondered whose side you would be on, Saurfang. Come to speak _ reason _ to the Banshee Queen? Would you have me accept the boy king’s proposal, then? It’s an _ honorable _ gesture, after all.”

To her shock, Saurfang gave a derisive snort. “I would have no choice but to challenge you if you did, Warchief. Ashenvale was stained red with the blood of Horde soldiers from the Barrens to the beaches of Darkshore because you decided that battle was necessary. I stood by you then. All of that death and suffering to secure Darnassus...to throw that away _ now _ is unthinkable.”

Against her will, Sylvanas felt her ears settling into a more relaxed cant. “If breaking this cycle were as simple as Wrynn suggests,” she agreed, “I need not have moved on Teldrassil at all. The moment the Alliance is free to strike...our grip on peace is tenuous enough as it is, with leverage against them. A city for a city. And the Horde already in a weaker position, with Whisperwind free to rally what remains of her people...”

Sylvanas froze.

Saurfang didn’t notice, his deep rumble mournful. “We would place ourselves in a weaker position than ever, yes. More than that, it would prove that striking the World Tree was never necessary. You have convinced me that it was. But—”

A raised hand silenced him. Sylvanas needed to think.

A city for a city. Allow the “joint administration” of Lordaeron, but keep Darnassus under lock and key...not even Wrynn would agree to that. As it stood, the moment Sylvanas’ grip on Teldrassil began to weaken, the Alliance could throw everything behind a liberating strike without consequence.

And yet.

“Yes, High Overlord,” she said slowly. “I believe I _ will _ return to negotiations. It would appear the Alliance has something of value to trade after all.”


	3. Negotiation II

The tension, when Sylvanas returned to the table an hour later, was a solid mass. It was tempting to jab a spoon into the air just to see if it would stick there.

She wasted no time; she would not allow Wrynn the initiative, not this round.

“Upon further consideration,” she announced before Greymane had found his seat. “Your proposal almost has merit. I would be willing to consider it, under certain conditions.”

Anduin blinked in shock, but recovered quickly. “That’s...fantastic. Wonderful, in fact! What conditions are you proposing?”

Sylvanas took several moments. She was...uneasy, even with the thunderbolt realization she had made an hour earlier. Too many things could go wrong with this plan, too many moving parts.  _ And yet. _

“Currently,” she said, voice slow and careful, “I have control of Darnassus as well as Lordaeron. What you ask is that I cede  _ both, _ in exchange for nothing but a nebulous promise that this time will be different and I will not be faced with the genocide and expulsion of my people. Appearances aside, you are not quite the fool Greymane believes you to be; you knew the offer would not be accepted.”

“I don’t—” Greymane protested. Anduin hushed him. Sylvanas ignored the interruption.

“I already have a method of  _ enforcing _ my people’s safety. Offering me a weaker bargain with no stronger guarantee than  _ hope  _ is an insult to their suffering, and to the loyalty of the Horde soldiers who died to secure their future.” 

She glanced at Saurfang. He was confused, but the wariness she expected was not there. On some level, even the purely strategic, she had earned his faith. Good. She would need him on her side. 

“However,” she continued, keeping her eyes on her general. “A peace that lasts a thousand years, if it ends with a Kaldorei revolution that plunges the world into a blood war of retribution, was never a worthy goal. And so I have a  _ counteroffer, _ little lion. I  _ will  _ allow a limited Alliance presence in Lordaeron. No more than half of the civilian population; no more than one-third of the armed presence. But if you intend to occupy my capital city, you can hardly begrudge me maintaining control of Darnassus. I might be convinced to...loosen my grip, somewhat.”

“That…” Anduin glanced at Whisperwind, whose ears and jaw were tense. After a moment her gaze flicked to the side and she gave a tiny, imperceptible nod. “That sounds… as if it would be a worthwhile place to start. I was proposing cooperation, not a military occupation, but… if we build a foundation of trust, we can continue to work toward a world in which neither city is under occupation.”

Sylvanas gave a mirthless smile. “I think not. If you will allow me to continue—I have yet to make an offer.”

The Alliance looked wary; but Anduin gestured after a moment.

“Any such agreement will be weighted to favor the Alliance,” said Sylvanas, not mincing words. “Oh, certainly, the first time violence breaks out against my people, your hand-chosen occupying champions may well intercede on our behalf. I grant you that much;  _ you, _ at least, are hardly the backstabbing type. But how many such skirmishes will there be? How many Forsaken will be lost each time?”

“Humans would die as well,” Anduin pointed out, quietly. “We have no more taste for violence than you.”

Sylvanas was unmoved. “Your kind breed like rabbits. A series of...incidents...would work in your favor. If both populations were reduced to a tenth of their strength, in twenty years there would be a new generation of human citizens while our numbers dwindle ever further.  _ You _ can replace your population.” She turned to look Greymane deliberately in the eye. “The Forsaken cannot.”

Anduin sighed, but didn’t argue the point.

“No Blight,” he said. “No plague bombs. Any other forms of security are negotiable. Now, what of Darnassus?”

Sylvanas examined her nails. “As I said. I have no intention of surrendering my only security against  _ further  _ treachery toward my people. But I am...realistic. Crushing force is only sufficient to control a population for so long. None of the peoples of Azeroth—or perhaps, very few,” she corrected with a gracious nod to Saurfang, “understand this better than the Forsaken. A single slip in power...and so, it is in the best interests of my people, and the Horde as a whole, for the citizens of Darnassus to be...less inclined to rebel at the first opportunity.”

Whisperwind gave a vicious scoff. Sylvanas merely smiled.

“The solution is more simple than you seem to believe,” she murmured. “I need only create a situation in which the risks of rebellion outweigh the thought of continuing to live under occupation. A failsafe.”

Greymane snarled. “What kind of  _ failsafe? _ ”

Sylvanas pretended he hadn’t spoken. “For now, this...insurance...will allow me to lift the harshest restrictions on the population of Darnassus. A far more  _ focused _ threat. When they learn that their lives can continue peacefully provided there is no intransigence, when they understand that retribution will be immediate and certain should the Horde’s interests be threatened, when they are forced to  _ accept  _ the new status quo, even the Kaldorei will learn to bend.”

“I wouldn’t count on that, Sylvanas.” Anduin’s voice was quiet. Sad. As if she’d disappointed him somehow. How...sweet.

“Of course, for such a thing to work,” she continued, “The threat must be entirely outside the power of the citizens of Darnassus to affect. A detached location. It cannot be merely symbolic; I do not count the honor of the Night Elves so cheaply as to think that they will value any object, however sacred, over the lives of their fellows. And it must be  _ permanent. _ Something both Horde and Alliance will recognize as irreversible. Only then will it serve its purpose and allow the situation to...settle.”

She took a moment to savor the silence. On the Horde side was merely confusion, with trepidation from some of the more intelligent faction leaders. On the Alliance side...slowly mounting rage. Some were merely bristling at the idea of losing; others, like Greymane, were clearly just waiting for her to name her blood price so that they could finally lose their tempers.

Sylvanas stood slowly, smiling—this time with fangs—as she locked her gaze on Whisperwind.

“How  _ convenient,  _ High Priestess,” she purred, “that you are no longer married.”

It took a moment of delicious confusion before the implication finally registered.

Even with the wide variety of bombs, mining charges, and various unstable munitions easily at hand in the heart of Bilgewater territory, the resulting explosion put them all to shame.

Greymane bellowed the loudest, incoherent through his flashing teeth; but Alleria, leaping to her feet, was nearly his equal. The Lightforged at her side seemed briefly to have forgotten her aversion to the Void abomination a foot away as both of them shouted. Wrynn was dumbfounded; Jaina Proudmoore, for once, seemed beyond words. The dwarves and the High Tinker were on their feet as well, not that anyone could tell.

Most of the dwarves. Moira Thaurissan alone remained seated, eyebrows threatening to vanish into her hair.

The Horde reactions were quieter in terms of volume—for the most part. Thalyssra’s exclamation of  _ “What?!” _ rose over even Greymane. Baine seemed primarily stunned. Gallywix was laughing so hard he seemed in danger of falling off his chair, in which case Sylvanas had to privately hope he would break his neck and allow Gazlowe’s elevation. Saurfang and Rokhan were watching her warily; Lor’themar’s good eye was closed as he rubbed his temple.

But it was Whisperwind herself that Sylvanas watched carefully, as the wrath of her allies crashed against the walls of Gallywix’s palace like the inrushing tide. Her ears had stood nearly on end in the instant she grasped the demand being laid; for a moment silver light flashed in her eyes like lightning, like fury, but then it was cut off.

A sharp, short intake of breath, the inaudible gasp her only clear reaction even as her ears were still stiff and indignant. But there was something else there, as well. A flinch, almost invisible at the corners of her eyes, the line of her shoulders.

A brief slip in her mask. A glimpse of  _ hurt, _ raw and profound.

So be it. Sylvanas would not hold Whisperwind in contempt for her pain; she simply didn’t care.

“With the High Priestess under lock and key,” she began, steady and calm but merciless, and was cut off by Thaurissan.

“Oh, aye,” she said slowly, shaking her head in something near disbelief.  _ “That’ll  _ keep Darnassus quiet for certain. But that’s  _ cold, _ Warchief, an’ ruthless, even for you. I can’t say it’s not a little brilliant, at that. But ten thousand years, and the man’s been dead less than a season…”

“I acknowledge your grief,” Sylvanas said, coolly, still forcing Whisperwind to hold her gaze or else look away first. “Mourn as you will. In the meantime, your people remain prisoners.”

The boy king’s mouth worked soundlessly for several moments before he took a long, shaky drink from the glass of water in front of him and tried again.

“So,” he managed to rasp. “Ah. You are...your proposal—that is...you’re  _ suggesting _ ...”

Whisperwind seemed not to hear him.

_ “You,” _ she breathed, despair briefly winning out over rage in her bright eyes. “You... _ planned  _ this—you killed him so that you could...”

For a moment, Sylvanas considered taking credit for that kind of foresight; but with how close half the Alliance was to refusing anyway, pretending they were falling helplessly into that kind of long-running trap might only encourage them to refuse on principle.

“I killed the Archdruid to demoralize the Kaldorei,” she said shortly. “Had you found the courage to show your face in that battle, you would have been slain as well. I will remind you that allowing any loosening of Darnassus’ chains was not  _ my _ idea. If you seek the mastermind of this little humiliation, look to your left.”

Anduin looked stricken. Whisperwind, as if to make up for her momentary surge of emotion, set her jaw and flicked her ears back, resembling nothing so much as an angry nightsaber.

_ “Who,” _ she demanded, voice like black ice--cold, smooth, completely flat, and deadly to the unwary.

Sylvanas felt an eyebrow quirk slightly.  _ That _ was a fascinating side of Tyrande Whisperwind that was too infrequently witnessed. Nearly enough to be  _ alluring, _ in its own way. She almost regretted ruling herself out within moments. Nevertheless, for the sake of argument, she allowed herself to entertain the notion.

Allowing herself a languid smirk, she replied, “It would mean a great deal of fuss; but let it never be said that I am unwilling to make sacrifices for the Horde. Which only leaves us the necessity of finding a suitable prospect.  _ Traditionally, _ the honor should fall to the victorious general.”

Whisperwind gave an involuntary hiss. Saurfang’s head whipped around so fast Sylvanas expected his neck to snap and silently resigned herself to summoning a val’kyr for him; eyes wild with a mixture of anger, betrayal, and animal terror, he gaped at her in horrified silence. 

After just enough time for a ripple of revulsion to circle the table, she let her smirk widen. “However, I intend to have Lord Saurfang overseeing security in the Undercity during much of his time. Keeping you there, so close to Alliance forces in Lordaeron, would defeat the purpose. Orgrimmar is better, certainly; but perhaps a bit too  _ temptingly _ close to Ashenvale, and I will tolerate your presence in neither city with your penchant for bloody vengeance besides.”

“You’re insane,” Proudmoore whispered from the head of the table. “If you think anyone will even  _ consider _ allowing—Anduin!”

_ “No one,” _ Greymane snarled, “is considering allowing this.”

Whisperwind placed a hand over his arm; the touch was gentle, but her voice held steel. “That is not your decision to make.”

“High Priestess,” protested Proudmoore. “No one is questioning your devotion to your people, but the idea of going along with something like this is nothing short of—”

“Forgive me,  _ High King,” _ Sylvanas drawled. “But as you can see, the Horde brought only its highest level of negotiating power out of deference to the seriousness of the situation.  _ Do _ muzzle your dogs, if you insist on bringing them.”

“Both Jaina and King Greymane are more than qualified to speak at these negotiations,” Anduin replied firmly.

“Is that so.” She smiled. “I was clear, I thought, that this was meant to be a meeting only between heads of state. Those with  _ nations _ to lead?”

Greymane, whose hackles were already on end and who was already growling so fiercely he was beginning to drool on the table, was physically unable to express any more anger; but Proudmoore went white, taking half a step back from the table as if she’d been slapped.

Good. Sylvanas was growing tired of her interference.

“Breathe easy, High Overlord,” she said, just loud enough to cut through the rising side arguments. Saurfang’s stricken expression only wound tighter; he looked even more green than was normal, and Sylvanas dipped her head to him slightly. It had been a bit of a mean-spirited prank, considering his reliability and loyalty to the position of Warchief. “I suspect the High Priestess would like  _ nothing _ so much as five minutes alone with the orc who killed Malfurion Stormrage.”

Seemingly outside of her control, Whisperwind’s ears twitched even further back. 

Sylvanas patted Saurfang’s shoulder, once. “Your untimely demise at the hands of your estranged wife would be a poor repayment for your service, old soldier; and I still want her nowhere near Orgrimmar. We shall settle on a more suitable husband.” She stepped around him, walking slowly behind the line of Horde leaders while Whisperwind watched her, wound tight and pale with more than just rage. 

Sylvanas paused. It would seem the word ‘husband’ cut deeper into Tyrande’s psyche than she had intended. She noted it, for use as a weapon; and then noted to keep that weapon sheathed, for now. It would grow dull if used too often.

“Baine,” she said evenly. Then, “Your people have been Horde nearly as long as the Darkspear. You have extended...tolerance, if never true friendship, to my people. I take it you will not assume a slight on your honor, if I say I have no confidence in your willingness to do what must be done regarding...containment...or should contingencies against the cooperation of Darnassus come into play.”

Baine gave a low warning snort. “I consider it the highest compliment. I would play no part in this regardless.”

“There has long been friendship between the Tauren and the Kaldorei,” Sylvanas observed. The gentle understanding in her voice, she was sure, fooled no one; she did  _ not _ trust Baine, fully believed he would turn traitor in an instant if pressed on this matter, and was barely restraining herself from curling her lip at that blatant weakness. But the Banshee Queen could lash out on such matters; the Warchief could not. She was not unaware of the price of her new position of power. And so she spoke with low politeness. “I respect your history, and the long years of loyalty Thunder Bluff has offered the Horde; I would not place you in such a position.”

Baine still rumbled; but the shallow, seated bow of acknowledgement he offered her was graceful, and his eyes no longer held resentment.

Interesting.

Rokhan made a face before she had even addressed him, lips curling with vague disgust above his impressive tusks.

“Don’t be askin’, mon,” he said, not quite rudely. “If the Warchief orders, the Darkspear obey; but the Hand of Elune, on land sanctified to the Loa…that be a cruel thing to do to a people.”

“I think not,” Sylvanas agreed quietly. “Aside from the fact that you have yet to be formally confirmed as chieftain of the Darkspear and this arrangement requires stability—the Echo Isles are less secure by far even than Orgrimmar.”

She moved on, fingers trailing along the back of Rokhan’s chair as she paused behind Gallywix.

A pointed arch of one long eyebrow. She let the moment stretch, let her smirk widen by the second at the expressions on every Alliance face. When the horrified silence had lasted long enough, she moved on without a word.

“Regent Lord,” she said instead.

Lor’themar drew his head back slightly, as if surprised that she would suggest it; after a moment he sighed and seemed to realize the appropriateness of the suggestion. “I hardly need to express my aversion to the idea, Sylvanas,” he said, resigned. “But you’ve made your point about the lack of other suitable options.” Reluctantly, he inclined his head to Whisperwind. “I will not pretend to like you any more than the situation in which we have found ourselves, High Priestess; but we need not make one another _ too  _ thoroughly miserable.”

Sylvanas hummed. She had, of course, thought through every angle of this already; but it was necessary to lead all factions through her thought process, if she intended to wrangle their agreement.

“Proximity to the Sunwell would work wonders in keeping the blessing of Elune in check,” she allowed. “And Silvermoon is not helpless. But I have concerns. The population has come nowhere near recovering from its decimation; the guard is weaker than it should be, and the city spread too thin, with too many broken walls and empty buildings. Attempting to contain a Sentinel in a city surrounded by lush forests...and Silvermoon has direct magical links to the Undercity. I worry for our security.”

Lor’themar made a valiant attempt to hide his relief at the out she was offering him. “I’m certain steps could be taken,” he said. “Silvermoon is far from weak; and if the High Priestess entered such an arrangement on her word…”

“Her word is insufficient,” Sylvanas informed the group at large. “Should she ever slip our defenses, there is nothing but forest between her and Lordaeron. Or Stormwind. I would remove her from that continent entirely.”

Greymane growled low in his throat. “Even if there was any chance of the Alliance going along with this,” he said. “You won’t allow her in the Eastern Kingdoms and you won’t allow her near Orgrimmar or in Thunder Bluff! There is no point to any of this.”

Tightly, Whisperwind agreed. “This is a great deal of dramatics only to make the point that your entire proposition is a non-starter. If your intent was to humiliate me, you have only embarrassed yourself.”

“It would seem I’ve wasted all of our time,” Sylvanas agreed, amiably, nearly cheerful. “Wouldn’t you agree,  _ First Arcanist?” _

For just a moment, neither of them understood.

Then the axe fell.

In the space of a heartbeat both Thalyssra and the High Priestess had leapt from their seats and scrambled back against the walls in their haste to get away from one another. It was almost comical, Sylvanas thought; the identical expressions on their faces—anger and disgust and the dawning realization that there truly were no other options.

“Absolutely  _ not,” _ said Thalyssra.

Once again, Sylvanas pretended there had been no interruption. She spoke only to Whisperwind.

“I trust,” she said, “that we can count on your full cooperation.”

Tyrande made no attempt to control the curl of her lip. “This entire discussion is meaningless unless an agreement is reached for Darnassus.”

“And Lordaeron,” added Anduin, softly.

_ “Darnassus.” _ Her tone brooked no further corrections. “I expect generosity in your terms. I will commit to nothing that does not  _ markedly _ benefit my people.”

“Warchief.” Thalyssra tried again.

Sylvanas smiled. “But of course. So long as I make myself clear, High Priestess. I am not unreasonable; policies and  _ consequences _ for both Lordaeron and Teldrassil will be mutually beneficial. But your surrender is not a question of debate. I will have you as collateral, or you will have nothing.”

_ “Warchief,” _ Thalyssra insisted. “A word. _ Immediately.” _

Sylvanas gave a careless wave of the hand in the direction of the Alliance. “Discuss your opening offers,” she commanded. “When I return, we shall begin.”

Cape whipping behind her, she strode from the room; Thalyssra, flickering with indignation and arcane energy, stalked out at her heel.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Fun fact: In the early planning stages of this AU, I seriously considered making this an arranged marriage between Tyrande and SYLVANAS, but still a Thalrande endgame.
> 
> Frankly, I think we as an internet people, collectively, need to dip more often into that specific subversion--the romance does not necessarily have to be between the two individuals being married, especially in a contrived political arrangement. But that's a soapbox for another day. Obviously, I really wanted to lean into the more traditional arranged marriage concept in large part because it didn't already exist (which baffles me, like, @ fandom come on now) for this one, but that alternate possibility haunts me.
> 
> I think it'd be an incredibly compelling AU, and someone should totally write it!


	4. Binding

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> As you may have noticed, I have gone and added chapter titles; I don't know for certain how long this one's gonna be but it will end up getting long enough that without some form of "clue" it will get pretty impossible to navigate before long!
> 
> Also, we are out of Sylvanas' head. I can all but guarantee that she will be a recurring POV in the future; for now though, this IS, after all, a story about Tyrande and Thalyssra and that razor-wire fence they've built between them.

The Warchief’s stride was long and forceful, and she showed no signs of slowing or stopping any time soon as she swept down the corridor. Thalyssra, through the fury rising in her blood like a manastorm, understood the wisdom of wanting to take this discussion as far from prying ears as possible.

She just didn’t care all that much, particularly, at the moment.

Mana crackling in her ears, she caught Sylvanas’ arm in a bruising grip and yanked her to a stop. It earned a flare of scarlet and a warning hiss—but undead strength was only worth anything if she had the concentration to use it and an aura of menace only worked on those who allowed themselves to be intimidated.

At the end of the day, Sylvanas Windrunner came up to Thalyssra’s shoulder only by virtue of her ears. Thalyssra was not above using that to her advantage.

“Are you,” she demanded, _ “Completely _ insane?”

“A matter of some debate, First Arcanist,” Sylvanas retorted, eyes narrowing in a further warning. _ “Hold your tongue.” _

“I’ll hold nothing, you _ cannot _order me to do this!”

“I can order you to do whatever I wish,” the Warchief pointed out, short and cold. “I cannot force you to _ comply _ in this matter, true; I lack that authority. But my _ orders _stand. You will wed the High Priestess and contain her in Suramar.”

Thalyssra drew herself up. “I will _ not. _”

Sylvanas made an expression that was not a smile. “You surprise me. I was under the impression the shal’dorei were _ eager _ to prove their worth to the Horde.”

Thalyssra pinned her ears back, baring teeth that were _ significantly _ more impressive than quel’dorei pinpricks.

“Is that it, then?” she hissed. “You would have me _ prove myself _ by—what exactly are you accusing me of, Warchief? _ Split loyalties? _ If you truly believe that, then—” 

“I accuse you of nothing,” said Sylvanas, infuriatingly even. “I merely observe that you speak eloquently of your value to the Horde, until you are placed in the position of having to _ inconvenience _yourself for its sake.”

“Inconvenience—!” Thalyssra reeled back, nearly dumbstruck. “I am _ entirely _ willing to make sacrifices for my people. The Horde are my people now as well, Warchief.”

“I’m glad to hear it.”

Thalyssra plowed forward. “This is—you have no right to ask this of me. You have no right to ask this of _ her! _ If you want Tyrande Whisperwind as a prisoner, do us both the courtesy of holding her as such outright, without the insult of pretending it’s some form of _ union.” _

At that, something sharpened in Sylvanas’ gaze.

“Tell me, First Arcanist,” she asked, voice soft. “Do you _ listen _ when the _ lesser races _ speak?”

Thalyssra couldn’t help but bristle. “I have _ never _ used that term.”

That wasn’t...entirely true. She was Suramar nobility and the upper echelon at that, there were… she did not deny the mistakes of her past. Ten thousand years of isolation with the logic that there was no one around to be offended, coupled with the need to avoid causing friction while navigating high society, she hadn’t...believed it as truly as some, it wasn’t…

Regardless, the slur hadn’t crossed her lips since Elisande’s betrayal, and surely that counted for _ something. _

Choosing to ignore her, Sylvanas continued. “I made myself very clear. The goal of this arrangement is not merely to acquire yet another prisoner when I have thousands already in the Tree. A hostage exists only to be rescued; a prisoner creates tensions and...temptations. A call to heroism. Marriage forges a very real legal bond. It carries connotations of stability, even in a loveless match; permanence. _ Irreversibility.” _

“We do have a concept of _ divorce, _ Warchief.”

Sylvanas actually laughed at that. It was not a pleasant sound.

“And how many high-profile political unions between warring states have ever been dissolved in such a manner? I never marked you as a romantic.” She looked genuinely amused. “Keep whatever lover you so clearly value. This is a business transaction.”

“That is not—there’s no—I don’t _ have _ a—that is hardly the point!”

“No,” Sylvanas agreed. “The _ point, _ as you say in your ever reliable eloquence, is to _ legitimize the occupation of Darnassus. _ Legally, the Kaldorei will be a part of the Horde and the Warchief will have every _ right _ to make decisions about their governance. A marriage need not be viewed as _ happy _ to be viewed as _ binding.” _

Thalyssra was aware that desperation was starting to leak through. “Baine refused!”

“Baine was never asked,” Sylvanas corrected. “He is unsuitable in every way. I will not go over the logic behind your selection again; if you failed to pay attention, you may collect the notes from another delegation.”

“Do not _ patronize me, _ Banshee. I understand that there are no other candidates. That does not change my decision.”

Sylvanas raised a single eyebrow.

“There was one other. I _ did _ consider Lor’themar,” she admitted. “The possibility of a cross-faction heir would be worth the risk of her escape, which I will admit I overemphasized.”

Now it was Thalyssra’s turn for harsh laughter. “You’re delusional.”

“Your _ tongue, _ First Arcanist, I will not warn you a third time. And I am far from it. The woman is mourning and traumatized; Lor’themar is a gentleman; he would eventually have sought to comfort her and she might well have allowed it, isolated in Silvermoon.” She waved a hand. “But only ever an idle hope for all that. The chance is not realistic enough to justify the dangers. The agreement _ could _ have been made conditional on the existence of such an heir; but not without surrendering far too much in the negotiations. And of course, the kaldorei have suspected for years that Whisperwind is barren.”

Thalyssra was, finally, speechless.

Nothing Sylvanas had said was wrong; most of it wasn’t even cruel. But it was _ calculated _ on a level that cut her to the core, a sharp pragmatic steel that sliced through any soft considerations and bit into the bones of her goal.

To her discomfort, Thalyssra found she couldn’t judge her for it.

But—she had come up with all of this over the course of an_ hour? _

“Suramar has strong border defenses, and even more powerful wards; you are capable of containing even a powerful priestess and fending off any rescue attempts. It is isolated enough from the mainland that any escape would require tremendous, organized effort.” She began to pace, slowly. “The city is large enough to allow her visible, undeniable freedom of movement without giving the impression of keeping her on a leash, and small enough to allow close monitoring. Furthermore, Suramar is Whisperwind’s birthplace; the symbolism is undeniable, and far less hostile than sending a priestess of the moon to live in direct proximity to the Sunwell.”

Thalyssra couldn’t disagree with any particular point. But the fact remained…

She tried to picture it in her head. Her mind skittered away from even _ envisioning _ the ceremony itself like an Undercity spider from the sun. But imagining Tyrande of all people in her city, in her home, _ forever, _hating them all for it and having every right to...a sense of permanence, Sylvanas had said, and that permanence threatened to choke her.

With difficulty, she kept her voice even as she spoke. “Have I not been complicit,” she asked quietly, “In _ enough _ crimes against the kaldorei?”

Sylvanas went still. Then, very slowly, her ears folded back at _ precisely _ the angle to indicate clear anger without a loss of temper.

“For all your protestations, _ Thalyssra,” _ she said, voice deadly quiet, “You argue mercy for your cousins readily enough.”

_ “Our _cousins, Warchief.” Sylvanas Windrunner had been elven long before she was Forsaken.

“You object to the subjugation of Darnassus? Will you call it unprovoked as well? Claim that the Alliance _ committing genocide against my people _ was insufficient reason to ensure they will never again have the opportunity?”

Thalyssra was beginning to regret using her height to her advantage. She couldn’t lower her gaze to escape the accusation; Sylvanas was in the way.

The Warchief’s anger burned between them, silence ringing with condemnation. Finally, with the same meticulous care with which she had folded them in the first place, her ears returned to a perfectly neutral position. When she spoke again, her voice carried only just enough cold bite to betray that any simmering resentment lingered.

“You may, of course, refuse,” Sylvanas said with icy restraint. After a moment she took a step—slow, purposeful. 

Thalyssra lifted her chin and refused to move; she would not be goaded into circling like an animal. Nor would she give Sylvanas the satisfaction of betraying such an obvious sign of weakness. The only reason anyone would refuse to show the Banshee Queen their back was out of fear; Thalyssra was First Arcanist of Suramar. She _ flinched _ from no one.

“I can only assume that you are about to issue an ultimatum,” she said through her teeth.

She could _ hear _ Sylvanas quirking an eyebrow. “Threaten my subjects? You think so little of me, First Arcanist!”

And there it was; that audible smirk, the cloying sweetness. Sweet like an Apothecary’s honey, and just as deadly; Thalyssra felt the hair on the back of her neck prickle.

“No,” Sylvanas informed her. “I have no need for threats. You know as well as I what the Horde will think of your so flagrantly undermining my position in front of the Alliance; you know that Suramar bears a ledger of blood it has yet to repay. Such a loss of face, throwing away the trust you so recently earned rather than pulling your weight? I never thought you such a fool. How many such...missteps...will it take, before the other races of the Horde begin to resent the lives lost in Suramar’s defense?”

Thalyssra glanced over her shoulder. “Perhaps our languages have diverged more than previously thought. What does the word ‘threat’ mean in Thalassian, Warchief?”

Another quiet laugh. “The damage to my plans would not be so severe as to warrant _ that, _First Arcanist. As you say, in the absence of the legal securities a marriage contract would provide, holding the High Priestess captive outright would at least provide a short-term benefit.” 

Every word was soft; she had started to circle again, her steps unhurried. Deliberate. Thalyssra, quite unintentionally, felt her ears twitching to follow the Warchief’s movements.

“I am entirely capable of arranging an open prisoner exchange, if you wish it, to spare your _ conscience,” _ Sylvanas murmured in a parody of concession. “I can bind Tyrande Whisperwind in saronite and seal her in the deepest mage-vaults beneath Suramar. The choice of whether she ever sees starlight again is yours entirely.”

Thalyssra’s control finally cracked; she whipped around to meet the Warchief’s eyes and found even less mercy there than she had expected.

And Sylvanas would do it. Thalyssra had no doubt of that; she would not risk the lynchpin of her scheme backing out at the last moment. If Thalyssra refused, she _ would _ return to the Alliance and find some insufferably clever way to manipulate the situation, change the rules; goddess, Tyrande might even _ prefer _ it that way. As Sylvanas was clearly aware, there was a _ dignity _ in being held by force rather than agreeing to bend.

Briefly, Thalyssra chided herself. Of _ course _ Sylvanas was aware of that. Of course Sylvanas Windrunner understood the desire to fight tooth and bloody nail against tangible bonds rather than concede so much as an inch by your own free will.

Who else on Azeroth understood that better?

Why else would she have arranged it this way, forcing Tyrande to be complicit in her own imprisonment?

Of course Sylvanas knew exactly what she was doing. And of course she was too coldly efficient to hesitate when she believed the future of the Forsaken lay in the balance.

“...What am I meant to _ do _ with her?” Thalyssra asked pathetically.

Sylvanas gave a cruel smirk.

Unable to contain her snarl at the implication, Thalyssra soldiered forward before she said something the Nightborne would regret. “What manner of restraint do you expect me to deploy in keeping her...contained? You ask nearly the impossible! I will _ not _ have it fall on the heads of the shal’dorei if we do everything in our power and are simply outmaneuvered.”

With an only slightly mocking bow, Sylvanas gestured back down the corridor, to the negotiating chamber.

Thalyssra took a deep breath and squared her shoulders. She tried very hard not to notice the satisfaction on the Warchief’s face as she strode back through the doors.

* * *

Tyrande was so _ close. _

Eyes closed, shoulders loose and relaxed, she knelt in scarlet grass and tried to let the peace of the Goddess flow through her.

For some reason, she was finding this slightly difficult at the present time.

The tiny Moonwell she sat beside was young; weak and feeble, its power leeched by the abuses heaped upon this land. But what power it still possessed, it offered freely.

Tyrande refused to be grateful.

_ She _ was not the one who had insisted on the presence of such a font, when the arrangements for this caricature of a—of a ceremony were being made. That had been Thalyssra, quiet and firm, as if she thought Tyrande would believe it was a kindness. Was she meant to dab her eyes like a frightened maiden, soothed by this flickering, sickly reminder of Elune’s blessing when she carried it in her blood at every moment? Was she meant now to feel indebted to her new captor for tossing her scraps like a favored kitten?

No. Especially when the manipulation was so disgustingly transparent. The Banshee had taken Thalyssra aside before those negotiations; Tyrande had no doubt that the First Arcanist’s initial protests were genuine, there was no love lost there, but she had clearly been browbeaten into line.

Oh, Tyrande’s heart _ bled _ for her suffering.

This must have been Sylvanas Windrunner’s idea, yet one more petty cruelty she had placed in Thalyssra’s mouth to defuse any opposition. 

The presence of a Moonwell at the site of this _ travesty _ implied the blessing of Elune on the union. The Banshee refused to allow her even this. Even the sanctity of her goddess.

Rage threatened to engulf her again, the smell of blood and the gaunt, pale faces of her silent people pouring into Stormwind, the only ally with a hope of holding them all—an endless tide and yet too slow, so many and yet so, so very few before the portals were closed for good. The shaking messenger carrying her husband’s final farewell; the growing realization, a despair so deep she hadn’t known she was capable of surviving it, the empty void of eternity within her screaming heart, of knowing she had been just five minutes too late.

She would take every second of her people’s suffering, every second of Malfurion’s life that had been stolen from her, in Horde blood. She would take it by _ inches. _

But not now. Not yet.

She felt the Moonwell’s power flicker like a dying flame, and sighed softly. Her hatred was affecting it; and that, at least, was unfair.

But...comforting. Elune’s power answered her rage, rather than withdrawing from it. Whatever the optics of this sham wedding might imply—Tyrande’s goddess _ heard _ the silent cry of her priestess. When the time came, there would be no censure. Elune was the glint of moonlight off the edge of a knife, as much as the soft glow of healing. She would not ask Tyrande to be any less.

That thought, finally, was what allowed her to slip into meditation. She felt her rage, felt her goddess feel it too; and rather than feed on it, that recognition allowed her to let go.

Not to lessen it; the opposite, if anything. But she had been holding her anger in a death grip, clawing her nails bloody trying to cling to it as it writhed under her skin, as if any relaxing would mean betrayal.

But she was not alone in her howling desire for vengeance. She did not need to fight herself as well as her enemies. She let the fury flow, unchecked but not acted upon, and felt shadow and moonlight weave through her thoughts as her anger went from a boil, thrashing at being contained, to a rushing stream in her mind.

Better, she thought softly. Better. It would be there, when she needed to call upon it. It would _ always _be there.

In a way, holding the ceremony at Talrendis Point could nearly have been a mercy.

It wasn’t, of course. Windrunner _ had _ no mercy. She wished Tyrande as far from Ashenvale and Darkshore as reasonably possible; she would not allow Horde leadership to gather within Alliance-controlled lands, a precaution even Tyrande could not call paranoid; and she wished the presence of a Moonwell even if she feigned irritation with Thalyssra for suggesting it. That ruled out all but a handful of locations.

And so they were in Azshara, not terribly far from the walls of Orgrimmar but not close enough to be a real security threat; in a place familiar to the Alliance but controlled thoroughly by the Horde; outdoors to allow for as expansive a guest list as was required, because of course Windrunner insisted that the Alliance must _ see _ this; but in the open, in the machine-ravaged open forests of what was no longer a familiar land, where even Tyrande doubted her ability to vanish should she try to run.

She had considered it. It had been a foolish thought, however. If she wished to back out, she only needed to say so; the Alliance would back her, even if it meant losing Lordaeron forever, even if it meant never resettling Gilneas.

That was why she could not.

She breathed out, slow and steady, and let the serenity of the Moonwell wash against her troubled thoughts. The touch of its power did not try to soothe her anger; but it leeched some of the pain, the terrible isolation, like cool water against a burn.

She felt the _ wrongness _ of the approaching footsteps before she heard them, and any sense of peace was snuffed out with the suddenness of a falling axe.

Thalyssra was maddeningly dressed almost as if for mourning; long robes, loose-flowing but expertly tailored, in a midnight silk broken only by deep purple embroidery and striking, gold-and-silver highlights. Amaranthine sparks danced along the miniature leylines, surging with energy, perfectly controlled, highlighting Thalyssra’s silver hair and illuminating the shadows of her satin hood.

At her side, the Warchief was unchanged. All dark glowers and blood-red armor. Her cursed bow was slung over her shoulder, making Tyrande’s fingers itch for the weapon no one in their right mind would have permitted her. None of the Alliance leaders were armed, Sylvanas again allowing only Shalamayne; the security forces of both sides were permitted weapons, but the figureheads were not.

And oh, had Tyrande possessed only a single knife...

The grass did not fade and wither around Sylvanas Windrunner’s feet as she approached, but Tyrande thought viciously that it _ would _have done if it possessed any sense.

She did not wait for Windrunner to come near; whatever else she might suffer, whatever she was willing to trade for the sake of her people, not for free would the Banshee Queen have the pleasure of Tyrande kneeling at her feet.

Thalyssra made a sharp, abortive movement as Tyrande stood—as if she had expected an attack. Perhaps as if she were planning to step forward and offer a hand, and had thought better of it.

For a long moment Windrunner simply flicked her gaze over Tyrande from a distance, sagely remaining out of arm’s reach; apparently she could find nothing to object to. Red eyes lingered on the clasp of Tyrande’s robe—a silver medallion bearing the sigil of the Cenarion Circle, a symbol she had absolutely no legitimate right to wear any longer. But the Warchief had made an oil-slick show of respect during the negotiations, allowing for Tyrande’s right to bear a mourning token at the very least. She could not deny such a small thing now.

Finally, Sylvanas spoke.

“Know this, High Priestess.” Her voice was quiet under that unnatural echo; nearly soft, but with not a drop of remorse. “Your suffering is tangential. Kindness or cruelty; make of that truth what you will.”

Tyrande did not dignify her statement with a response. After a moment, Windrunner gave a mocking bow and gestured through the trees, toward the low murmur of voices that marked the location of the ceremony.

Tyrande turned her back on the Warchief, and took pleasure only in the way Thalyssra flinched away from any slight movement as she took her place at Tyrande’s side.

* * *

The worst thing— 

Well, Thalyssra amended as she stepped through the arch and began the long, slow walk between the assembled Horde and Alliance forces. The _ worst _ thing was obviously that Tyrande’s husband had been executed and her capital occupied and her people displaced and then she had been married off to the first warm Horde body capable of holding her prisoner against her will when and if the time came to do so.

Perspective.

But here, now, in this moment—

Tyrande was _ breathtaking. _

Resplendent in deceptively simple mooncloth, the rising sun bringing out a thousand shades of emerald in her braided hair. What at first glance looked like bracelets proved to be steel bracers, engraved with the image of a wolfhound gored and trampled beneath the hooves of a fighting stag. A simple silver belt supported equally intricate, empty sheathes that should have held paired hunting knives. Thalyssra was barefoot in deference to tradition; Tyrande wore supple boots in white leather, fastenings again made in bright steel rather than silver.

It was nothing short of perverse.

She looked like a _ bride, _ white and silver and glowing like starlight; the martial touches did nothing to change that.

It was, at least, a mercifully brief ceremony. In the interests of controlling a nigh-inevitable riot, the guest list was sharply limited to five hundred people total; and Sylvanas’ desire to avoid a fight breaking out meant there would be no gathering afterward.

A Nightborne wedding—a _Kaldorei_ wedding—should by rights have taken place, if not at midnight, then at dusk.

But then, none of this had ever been about them. Sylvanas would never have allowed this to happen at the height of Tyrande’s power, where she could see in the dark and the other races could not. Of _ course _ the High Priestess would have to be bound now, as the power of the night was slowly, inevitably subsumed and the daywalking races of the Horde came into greater power.

There was a moment, just a moment, of blistering hesitation as they stepped within touching distance of the waiting Warchief. Tyrande dropped Thalyssra’s arm willingly enough; but where Thalyssra forced down a sigh and held out her hand for Sylvanas to take, Tyrande raised her hand halfway and visibly froze.

Even the rustling trees seemed to hold their breath.

After a moment, with a care Thalyssra had to assume was for the benefit of the armed Alliance security forces watching her every move, Sylvanas reached down and placed two fingers under Tyrande’s palm. The slight pressure was enough; tense and stiff, but not actively resisting, Tyrande allowed the Warchief to place her hand over Thalyssra’s.

It was short, simple, and formulaic. The introduction of vows was very...human, or sin’dorei, or both; night elf bonds were internal, their weddings rarely involving formal oaths and never requiring them. But to solidify this particular hostage situation, they were not optional.

Almost before it had begun Sylvanas inclined her head to them both, binding their clasped hands loosely in white ribbon—and that was _ not _ a sin’dorei tradition, making Thalyssra suspect they had borrowed more of this ceremony from Lordaeron than she realized.

With a mental stutter that had to have been nearly audible, Thalyssra realized there was a hint of amusement dancing around the Warchief’s lips, and that she had most certainly lost track of where they were in the ceremony as Tyrande looked up at her, expression perfectly blank and murder in her eyes.

Her—wife—took the initiative, leaning in with a hand on Thalyssra’s chest for balance. Using Thalyssra’s face to hide her lips from the audience, Tyrande placed them a hair’s breadth from her ear.

“Touch me,” she breathed gently, “and I will slit your throat while you sleep.”

It was only ten thousand years of experience in politics that allowed Thalyssra to control the urge to pin her ears back and hiss.

_ This was not my idea, _ she thought, furious at the accusation, resentment flaring up in a sharp, painful tongue of flame that licked at her ribs, slowly raising her blood to a boil. _ I was not the one who agreed to it, this was never my desire, this is not my _ fault. 

But she had no such recourse to conceal her reactions. Trapped, she forced down her anger and brushed a chaste kiss over Tyrande’s temple.


	5. Morning

If Tyrande lay very still and listened carefully, she could hear the dawn chorus beginning in the distance.

Unfamiliar birdsong; morning larks and warblers, the delightfully odd hoarse rasping of birds of paradise, the mournful cry of peacocks. Closer there were cranes, calling by the waterfront.

_ Unfamiliar, _ she thought again. How long had it been, that even the  _ birds _ were wrong here?

She had hoped…

Well, she had been wrong. Wrong to think that lying still with her eyes closed and meditating on birdsong would be enough to shield her for a few precious moments. As if the faint, cloying floral perfume in the bedsheets wasn't enough to remind her of where she was. It was certainly enough to give her a headache.

She let her eyes open without fanfare, allowing herself a moment of petty irritation that she was waking at dawn. Their species was nocturnal by nature and the shal’dorei had been isolated from reality for ten thousand years; of all the changes to embrace wholeheartedly in such a short period of time, they might at  _ least  _ have held out against the diurnal schedule like civilized people.

It was, frankly, impressive that Tyrande had slept at all. 

Not that her sleep had been particularly restful; she was stiff and exhausted, sore from falling asleep tense and immediately slipping into fitful dreams. But while the ceremony she could not think of as a wedding had been mercifully, mercilessly short—over before she had time for the reality to come crashing down, but also before she had time to even begin to process any of it—the day itself had been...long.

The Warchief had dismissed any suggestion of a reception in the interest of removing Tyrande from Kalimdor as quickly as possible; Tyrande allowed herself a thin, grim smile at the thought. But there were policies to enact before Tyrande would allow herself to be moved so much as an inch from the other side of the portal, and practical arrangements to make on both ends.

Thalyssra, it turned out, was still in the reluctant process of relocating to the Nighthold. She had never made a habit of living there before, and with telemancy pads every three feet in Suramar she hardly had to worry about the commute. But her estate was too near the border—too near the forest—for Windrunner’s tastes.

They had lasted nearly six hours before their first near shouting match, which wildly exceeded Tyrande’s most optimistic predictions.

In...fairness, to the First Arcanist, it could not have been clearer that they both wanted badly to stick Tyrande in a minor guest room in an unused wing of the Nighthold and do their very best to forget she was there. But there were appearances to keep up. And Elisande had ruled Suramar for ten thousand unbroken years, leaving no incentive for any renovations to mold the Residence into anything outside her personal needs. 

And Elisande had been unmarried.

Which meant that the residential wing of the Nighthold was designed for the luxurious comfort of a single person, without an accompanying suite for a consort. As even Tyrande had to acknowledge that servants would talk if their political hostage (or, for that matter, the First Arcanist) resorted to sleeping on a sofa, this had forced her into Thalyssra’s bedroom.

Which was almost minimalist by Nightborne standards. Velvet drapes in a rich purple covered the windows on the dawn side; satins in violet and silver fluttered tastefully in doorways and at the rest of the windows, everywhere white marble and alabaster with plush rugs underfoot. Even the perfumed silk sheets were more subtle than was typical, a light touch rather than an overwhelming sensory experience.

Still  _ entirely _ too much; but Tyrande would take whatever small mercies she could find. For now, at least, Thalyssra was avoiding the trap of opulence and raw hedonism that had ensnared her predecessors.

There was a small noise at her back as she moved to sit up. Tyrande went still, then cast an incredulous glance over her shoulder. Silently, she corrected her brief, faint compliment.

It made sense, of course.  _ Tyrande _ was a Sentinel as well as a priestess; scouts and soldiers, while they quickly lost any sense of shyness around one another, were accustomed to sharing close quarters. They also learned to sleep still and silent, neither tangling themselves in blankets or interfering with the sleep of their fellows.

Suramar mages learned none of these things.

Naturally. Thalyssra was unused to any real need for  _ physical  _ discipline; she was intelligent, but soft. The war against Elisande had hardened her, taught her  _ some  _ measure of humility at least, and given her a much-needed dose of maturity; but a few months of hardship would not entirely overwrite ten thousand years of plush indulgence. In a soft, familiar bed, her subconscious would have no instincts countering the urge to seek out the nearest source of warmth.

She should have  _ known _ Thalyssra cuddled in her sleep.

Tyrande arched an eyebrow, watching her coldly. She weighed her options, tempted beyond reason to call down moonfire and sear the woman’s skin off for her gall, to put a hand around that elegant throat and press  _ down, _ or at the very least to shove her off the opposite side of the ridiculous bed.

On the other hand, if Thalyssra was awake, Tyrande would have to deal with her.

And she wanted...a moment. Just a moment without a thousand prying eyes, a dozen children hovering at her shoulder—she respected the races of the Alliance, she believed young Anduin in particular had a wisdom beyond his years, but there were times when they opened their mouths and the gulf of millennia yawned deep and profound between them. She wanted a moment _ alone. _ A moment to  _ breathe. _

Slowly, delicately, she moved to the side; the First Arcanist stirred faintly as her weight shifted, but eventually settled again.

Tyrande made no attempt to contain her derision. A near-fatal betrayal, the better part of a year spent scraping a desperate resistance movement out of bare stone on the outskirts of Suramar—and she  _ still _ hadn’t learned field discipline. How simple would it be, even now, to slip an assassin through her window?

Her eyes fell unwilling on the windowsill, where the faint glow of runes and an almost-invisible shimmer covered every inch of the space.

Very well. She could be fair. The point stood.

Were it  _ not  _ for the complex, interlacing wards woven of earth-shattering arcane power coating every flat surface and latticing every conceivable point of entry down to the gaps between stones, Thalyssra would be very easy to kill.

Tyrande rubbed her face, taking a deep breath that she finally let back out as a shaky, exhausted sigh. She was  _ tired. _ She didn’t have energy to spare chewing on her resentment when Thalyssra was only a symptom of the larger problem.

Unseeing, she gazed out the open window and over the mist-shrouded city of Suramar.

She wondered, bitterly, if the Banshee had ever returned to Silvermoon once the Undercity was established.

She doubted it. What comfort could familiar surroundings give, when the people you had loved no longer occupied them? What comfort could be found in a city so warped and twisted from the home it had been in simpler times? When all it could offer was a reminder of what had been lost? A reminder of blood and fear and smoke, and the screams of the dying. The crushing despair of realizing the defense was going to fail.

Tyrande closed her eyes.

_ Some day. Some day, I will kill you for that. _

Sylvanas Windrunner, she vowed, silently, would  _ not _ be allowed to get away with this.

Finally, she managed to stand without waking the First Arcanist. The stone floor was cool against her bare feet, nearly cold; she welcomed the slight chill as an antidote for her weariness.

The Broken Isles were actually slightly further south than Darnassus, geographically speaking. But Teldrassil, and Ashenvale and Hyjal before it, had the sheltering effect of Kalimdor to shield them from the worst of the chill. The Maelstrom held total sway over the currents of the Great Sea, dragging icy Northern water down along the coast; Durotar’s harbor was often shockingly cold considering the climate. But tucked behind the landmass to the west, Darnassus enjoyed extremely mild winters and warm summers; the overwhelming ocean currents created countercurrents in the more sheltered areas, sending warm water up to Teldrassil’s harbors.

But Suramar faced the opposite effect. With the Maelstrom drawing warm Southern waters up from Pandaria, the eastern coast of the Broken Isles was warm and humid; Val’sharah had been well nurtured by it, rarely if ever coming near a freeze even in the dead of winter, allowing for its lush growth. But by the time it reached Northrend the current had shed its warmth; and the resulting ‘backwash’ current the Maelstrom’s displacement caused on the opposite side of the island was nearly as powerful.

There was a reason the northeastern Kingdoms had such harsh winters; a powerful current ran down directly from Northrend and brought the chill straight to Lordaeron. Kul Tiras bore the brunt; the icy current struck the islands at an awkward angle, splitting raggedly around them and causing its infamous freezing waters and devastating winter storms. Suramar was not quite so vulnerable, out of the direct path of the strongest currents; but while its more sheltered position gave it a milder climate, it was still…

Cool, Tyrande thought, shaking herself as she realized how long she’d been staring blankly out a window. Cool and detached, not cold enough to have any real character, not warm enough to be inviting…

And she had no time to waste thinking about it. If the worst she had to deal with was slightly off-putting weather, she had no right to think of herself at all. Her people still lived under occupation or exile; however infuriating her captivity was, she had access to the personal quarters of a Horde faction leader. 

Did she intend to waste that opportunity on self-pity?

A stiff, awkward tour the previous evening had shown her enough to navigate easily. There were  _ entirely _ too many separate rooms for a private residence suite, and most of them held no interest for her; she dismissed the majority out of hand and nearly wrote off Thalyssra’s private lab as well before reconsidering. She would  _ have _ to keep meticulous notes; she could not risk doing otherwise, with the powerful forces the First Arcanist of Suramar played around with on a regular basis. Thalyssra was unquestionably the Horde’s primary magical resource; their breakthroughs, their experiments, everything would ultimately pass through her hands. Those notes could be revealing.

For now, however, Tyrande knew her strengths and they did not lie in decoding complex arcane theory.

Grateful that the Shal’dorei had kept the elven sensibility toward empty doorways and open floor plans, she let herself into Thalyssra’s study.

_ Elisande’s _ study, she corrected herself immediately, upon getting her first look at the room. Her opinions of Thalyssra aside, she would not do the woman the disservice of believing any of this had been designed to  _ her _ tastes.

‘Overboard’ would be the polite term.

It was only a modest chamber by Nightborne standards, but the study was at least smaller and more reasonable than most of the Grand Magistrix’s quarters. Round—she was inside one of the spires, then—and lined floor to vaulted ceiling with alternating glass and tall bookshelves. The desk faced out one of those picture windows, at an angle to the entryway so that Thalyssra could look out over her city but no one could slip in behind her.

It was...precisely the layout Tyrande would have gone with, which irritated her beyond reason.

There were several stacks of papers, all neat and one stack oriented horizontally in a manner that obviously meant something to its owner. A white peacock-feather quill rested in a vial of glittering golden ink on the windowsill; the left side of the desk contained a stoppered vial of plain black ink and a significantly more sensible swan-feather quill resting beside it.

Idly, Tyrande noted that the First Arcanist was a southpaw. Among the Sentinels, a left-handed archer was good luck; drawing with the opposite arm, they could stand back-to-back with their sisters and watch your back while firing.

She felt a surge of bitter, irrational resentment at the irony.

For now, she was most interested in the contents of the papers. Thalyssra kept her workstation clean and organized; in some ways that stymied Tyrande’s intentions, because there was no backlog of missives to sift through, but it also meant that there was no unimportant chaff and she could instantly locate exactly what she was looking for.

The first pile was nothing but expense reports, and Tyrande looked through those as quickly as she dared. Nothing jumped out as an obvious weakness; most of Suramar’s resources were going toward rebuilding and social assistance. Ten thousand years of stratification...

The military budget was lower than Tyrande had expected. So too was the ledger of Horde resources the city was bringing in outside of normal trade.

Work orders, security and infrastructure reports, a thick folder of documents organized chronologically, tracking attempts to heal the fel taint in the worst-affected portions of the city. A working scratch document of proposed legislation to levy stronger taxes on the upper class. Applications for arcane experimentation licensure, a concept Tyrande made a mental note to write to Stormwind about because the Alliance badly needed to steal it.

Testing the drawers found most of them locked, and Tyrande didn’t intend to start snapping enchanted locks until she had a better idea of what she was looking for and the wards protecting it. The top drawer, however, was unwarded.

Her mood, which had been so terribly pleasant already, soured further.

A copy of the  _ marriage _ contract, bound with twine to the significantly longer occupation treaty on which it was dependent.

It had to have been worth it.

Tyrande had, at least, gotten ironclad legal guarantees for the treatment of her people. There were pages and pages of regulations on acceptable punitive measures, the duty of care to a captive people, limits on what resources Sylvanas could demand of the Kaldorei and protections for at least some of the land. An injunction requiring a certain number of neutral Pandaren observers to ensure the terms were actually being followed. A bi-factional arrangement for the sorting and censoring of letters going in and out of Teldrassil. 

Rules governing hunting and registrations; many kaldorei would starve if the entire population were banned from owning weapons, and druids were a weapon unto themselves. Windrunner had coldly informed the negotiators that she would be within her rights to  _ force  _ them into the Dream and have guards and Nightborne immolation wards seal the barrows forever. She had then softened the ruling; “only” banning them from casting and shapeshifting, with the declaration that any transformed druid would be considered fair game if caught.

Tyrande took an unsteady breath at the thought. Requiring druids only to register their status and markings so their movements could be tracked had required the sacrifice of...more than she had wanted to give up. She flipped to the next section.

Arrangements for limited trade. No Alliance warships would be allowed within Kalimdor’s waters; all trade vessels would be inspected before being granted permission to approach, and only a certain number would be allowed per month. Those trade goods, provided they were legal and part of a pre-set list of products determined not to pose a security risk, would be subject to both a port tax and a tithe—at which point the imports would filter through Horde brokers first. Tyrande could have fought that point, if she hadn’t burned too much bargaining power saving the druids.

Perhaps that had been the wrong decision. She was biased, she knew that, knew Windrunner had baited her and that she’d fallen for it; and banishment to the Emerald Dream was no more than most druids actively sought, some for centuries or millennia at a time. But—the kaldorei  _ needed  _ their druids. Now more than ever.

And Windrunner would allow visitation.

It was in her best interests, of course, to allow night elves back  _ into _ the Tree. Many who had fled when they feared a sack were now anxious to return, despite the dangers. For some the risks of Horde occupation were worth it to escape the limbo of depending on Stormwind refugee services; for others, any danger would have been a small price to pay in order to find family members left behind. At the same time, the Horde wished to make use of some of the kaldorei in logging operations and as guides in Ashenvale and Darkshore; and some families in Stormwind would move mountains in order to bring one lost child to safety.

Those arrangements took the bulk of the treaty. Permits, clearances, flight licenses, the careful balancing of numbers, and harsh consequences in both directions if the terms of exchange were violated...

The whole arrangement was, of course, weighted heavily in favor of the Horde; but it was better than closed borders with no communication and no guarantees as to her people’s safety and fair treatment.

And yet, the cost.

A sigh from the entryway broke her train of thought.

“Well,” said the Nightborne woman leaning against the door frame.  _ “That _ wasn’t a bad dream, then. You can’t blame a girl for hoping.”

Tyrande placed the bundle of papers back in Thalyssra’s desk and drew herself up. “Can I  _ help _ you?”

The woman smirked and gave a low, courtly bow. “Arcanist Valtrois. At your service, naturally, under duress.”

Rushed footsteps interrupted any response Tyrande might have made. Thalyssra, wearing a rich purple robe and an alarmed expression, looked between them and closed her eyes. Slowly, she lifted her hands to rub her face.

“Valtrois,” she sighed. “What part of  _ wait for me in the breakfast nook _ …”

“Good morning to you as well, First Arcanist,” Valtrois greeted her with an imperiously arched eyebrow. “In ten thousand years, you know, I’ve never  _ once  _ set fire to the Nighthold when left unsupervised.”

“You’ve only been a qualified arcanist for seven thousand of those years,” Thalyssra said without lowering her hands. “It’s too early in the morning for this.”

Valtrois rolled her eyes. “I was bored, and I thought I would introduce myself to your  _ wife.” _

Tyrande tried and, she thought, succeeded at containing a flinch. Thalyssra didn’t bother trying.

“Please, Valtrois,” she said quietly.

The arcanist held her hands up in surrender. “I only meant that if you  _ will _ assign me to  _ babysitting duty, _ Thalyssra…”

Tyrande cleared her throat loudly.

Thalyssra finally lowered her hands from her face to fix a steely glare in Valtrois’ direction.

Unapologetic, Valtrois shrugged. “What brings you to grace us with your presence?”

Thalyssra gestured weakly around the room. “Eight separate silent alert wards activating at once. I’m sorry, Tyrande, I meant to attune you to most of the low-level security this morning. I had also intended to introduce you to Valtrois, who was  _ meant  _ to be on her  _ best behavior.” _

Valtrois gave a languidly dismissive wave of her hand. “You get what you pay for, First Arcanist.”

Thalyssra sighed.

“The Nighthold wards will allow me to know when you’re inside, once I attune them to you,” she informed Tyrande. “But you’re not under house arrest. Valtrois is, despite her personality, a trusted friend. She’s agreed to act as your guide, at least until you’re...more familiar with the layout of Suramar. Much has changed since you knew it.”

“That,” Tyrande informed her coolly, “is not quite so true as you seem to believe.”

Both sets of Nightborne ears twitched back with anger; Valtrois’ reaction, curiously, was far more intense. But when she spoke there was only a slight edge to her voice.

“I’ve been  _ volunteered  _ to make sure you don’t…”

She hesitated. Thalyssra stepped in with a quiet, “Get lost.”

Tyrande didn’t hide the mirthless smile. “If the word you are looking for is  _ escape.. _ .”

Thalyssra winced, and didn’t seem to have an immediate answer.

For several moments, Valtrois looked back and forth between them.

_ “Brr,” _ she finally decided. “Well! You two have fun with that. When you need me,  _ I _ shall be in the breakfast nook with a plate of chocolate croissants as per my clear instructions. By your leave, First Arcanist,” she added with a fluid, dramatic curtsy, sweeping out of the room with absolutely no attempt to gain Thalyssra’s leave whatsoever.

“...And  _ that _ is to be my jailer?”

It took several seconds after Valtrois’ departure for Thalyssra to visibly shake herself awake again. “Guide,” she managed. “Not jailer. And not all the time; she’s a brilliant arcanist and leyline specialist, and a better scientist. We need her. But yes, I’m assigning her to you for the time being.”

Tyrande arched an eyebrow. “I begin to question your assertions that you have no wish to torment me.”

That actually earned her a small snort of genuine laughter; Thalyssra smiled, but shook her head.

“Appearances are deceiving,” she said quietly. “I’m sure Valtrois seems like...well, whatever description you can come up with is probably more cutting than I could manage, but an overly dramatic socialite lush with equally ridiculous taste for wine and gossip and more fashion than sense sounds about right.”

“Generous,” Tyrande observed.

“She’s the bravest woman I know,” Thalyssra said simply. “I wasn’t flattering her when I said she’s brilliant to the point of being indispensable, but she was raised soft and wealthy. All she ever had to do was cooperate with Legion occupation. She would have been the jewel of Elisande’s court. She didn’t even need to fear the rebellion; she’s arrogant, yes, but never cruel, and generous to her underlings. She would have been cosetted by the elite, and never targeted by an uprising. She had nothing to lose.”

“She nevertheless took little convincing when your spies approached her, then,” Tyrande guessed.

A small smile flitted across Thalyssra’s face. “I never had to approach her, Tyrande. She was the first to rally to my cause, before Oculeth, before the Horde  _ or _ the Alliance. She believed me killed and entered exile of her own free will, in my name, seeking to find some way to free our people—alone, as she fully believed it would be. Don’t be fooled by her words; there is no loyalty in Suramar that will match hers for another ten thousand years. I thought I knew that  _ before _ I was left for dead. I had no idea.”

It was unfair, it was cruel even; but the truth was that Tyrande didn’t _ care. _ She didn’t want to stand here, choked by ambient mana in a city that had once been her home and which was now anything but, listening to  _ this. _ She didn’t want to  _ hear _ Thalyssra’s soft praise of the undeniable strength of character it took for a shal’dorei, under the full influence of the Nightwell, to exile herself from Suramar out of nothing but raw devotion.

She didn’t  _ want  _ to  _ respect  _ any of these people. Certainly not one who so thoroughly embodied everything she despised about her ‘cousins’.

“I hardly think the city can have changed so dramatically that I will require a _ guide,” _ she said finally choosing to ignore the rest. “But I doubt I am being offered a choice.”


	6. Sense of Direction

If anyone ever worked up the nerve to ask, Tyrande was _ not _lost.

Valtrois’ increasingly unsubtle offers to direct her toward whatever it was she was trying to find were to be ignored on this matter.

It was just slightly possible that the city had changed somewhat in the past ten thousand years, yes; but Suramar was still Tyrande’s homeland, and she could feel her way through its streets and canals. Eventually. 

It wasn’t as if she was under time pressure, after all. The dark cloud of resentment threatened to overwhelm her; for now, focusing on the meandering streets, she pushed it away.

“Hello again, Valtrois,” a red-haired guard greeted them as they rounded the corner.

“Please _ do _ shut up,” Tyrande’s shadow replied cheerfully.

This was the fourth time they’d passed this particular guard; after the first awkward encounter, she had settled on ignoring Tyrande’s presence as tactfully as possible. It...was a decision shared by most of the citizens of Suramar, it seemed. Valtrois received either the respectful distance due her rank, polite greetings, or familiar ribbing from those who had earned the privilege in the rebellion; Tyrande, they did not seem to know how to deal with.

She paused, eyes flicking over the canal below them and the arching bridges above, both of which had most certainly not been here ten thousand years ago. Suramar had been _ landlocked, _ the last she’d seen it. 

But surely turning left across the bridge would _ have _ to bring them to the next level, if the design of the city made any sense at all…

“What did you do this time?” a second guard asked, amusement thick in his voice.

Valtrois’ response was haughty. “I’m sure I don’t know what you mean.”

“To make Thalyssra this mad at you.”

“Thalyssra is not _ mad _ at me. I am escorting the First Arcanist’s wife.”

“Because you’re being punished and she’s out of filing to pass off on you this month?”

“This is a position of _ trust _ and _ dignity, _ and I do _ not _ do my own filing!” It was difficult to tell which accusation stung Valtrois’ pride more, and the redhead grinned and held up her hands in surrender. 

The Duskwatch was hurting for bodies, it seemed, if they were filling the ranks with sin’dorei. Neither Horde nor Alliance liked to acknowledge it; but Thalyssra’s first order of business after securing control of the city had involved a purge of the Guard bloody enough to rival even the fiasco in Dalaran. Few blamed her, even among the Sunreavers who had every reason to twitch at the concept. The Duskwatch under Elisande had possessed all the worst vices of the imperial Moon Guard in Tyrande’s distant memories, with precious few of their redeeming qualities; too many had drunk their power and privileges to the fullest _ before _ the Legion’s martial law.

With the doors opened to allow for darker cruelties, with the lines starker than ever between nobility and those who would survive only so long as their betters had more use for them than to feed to soul engines…

In truth, Tyrande had very little interest in sightseeing. Today was an exception solely because so much time trapped inside stone walls had her restless to the point of madness. Thalyssra had kept her word and attuned the Nighthold’s security clearance wards to her magical signature; Tyrande had spent most of her time the past six weeks reading through a long backlog of wartime reports she had never had access to before.

The excesses of the Nightborne nobility, at the height of the Legion’s occupation, had been...difficult to read. 

Thalyssra had taken excessive pains to control the slaughter when she had taken power. It hadn’t been enough; even a worm will turn, and the citizens of Suramar needed no records or corroborated witness statements to know who their tormentors had been.

Very few would be mourned. But the murders had been murders nonetheless, and Thalyssra’s attempts to show mercy to those whose victims had deserved far worse were not always enough to spare the killers’ lives. Suramar, despite its glossy veneer and sweeping vistas, was staggering and agonized under a thousand still-bleeding wounds. According to both Horde and Alliance intelligence, public opinion was still behind her; but many would never forgive the First Arcanist for what they saw as a betrayal, executing or imprisoning friends and family members who by every account had done Suramar a greater service with their single kill than most champions had managed over the course of an entire war.

The thought made her pause. There was a soft bump against her back as she stopped mid-stride, and Valtrois cursed.

“First Arcanist,” Tyrande said slowly.

_ “Ow. _ No, not yet I’m afraid, though if she gives the title to anyone else when she retires I _ will _ turn her into a goose and stuff a pillow with her. Nevertheless, flattery will get you everywhere.” Valtrois gave a grand gesture only to wince and rub her arm where she’d walked into Tyrande. “At your service, as per usual, _ stars, _ woman, your shoulderblades are like sculpted marble.”

Tyrande ignored this. “She deposed the Grand Magistrix,” she said. “Does she intend to take the title? Traditionally,” by which she meant ‘ten thousand years ago’ because until this moment the intricacies of shal’dorei social hierarchies and connotations had been very low on her list of priorities, “the position of First Arcanist was a collegiate one. Prestigious, but inherently subordinate. It denoted nothing more than a particularly skilled and intelligent advisor.”

Perhaps she shouldn’t have said anything. If the meaning remained unchanged, then the lack of a genuine Highborne title—_ Grand Magistri _ x had meant far more than arcane mastery; it was a true Imperial political appointment, the direct hand of Azshara, whereas a First Arcanist was a glorified scholar—placed the leadership of Suramar in a permanent state of uncertainty. Even the sin’dorei might not have recognized that; the title of _ magistrix _ had become so commonplace in their culture over the millennia that Elisande’s honorific was likely the next best thing to meaningless, falling on their ears...but not to the Nightborne. There would be an eternal sense of limbo, an unspoken weakness—a state with no real head. A vulnerability the Alliance could pry at.

Valtrois rolled her eyes. It was actually impressive the _ degree _ to which she managed it; this was a practiced maneuver into which serious study had been made. “Oh, not you too. _ Yes, _ it’s an academic title. But it is _ also _ one of the most ancient and revered offices in Suramar, and one she earned almost entirely by _ merit.” _

A delicate arch of Tyrande’s eyebrow expressed her skepticism; she was _ perfectly _ familiar with the politics of the Kaldorei Empire, thank you, and there was no such thing as a high-ranking position that could _ possibly _be reached without incredible amounts of political favor.

Valtrois looked irritated. “I said _ almost.” _

Tyrande acknowledged this with a shallow inclining of her head.

“My point,” said Valtrois testily, “is that there is _ no _ reason why she should give up a respected title she earned a thousand times over just to placate the Warchief.”

Tyrande had a split second in which to lock down her expression. She _ sincerely _doubted whether Valtrois had intended to tell her quite that much.

“Our people know her as the First Arcanist. They _ trust _ that title. It’s honest and untainted. I, for one, _ respect _ that she would prefer to be seen as a trustworthy advisor and a beloved servant to her people rather than yet another power-grabbing noble.” A dramatic sigh. “I doubt Suramar will _ ever _ have a Grand Magistrix again, after Elisande. No more than either of our peoples will have another Queen. Besides. The fact that she refuses to take a title she technically didn’t earn projects an image of humility and competence, and the Nightborne have had enough of pretension.”

Tyrande took a long moment to gaze at Valtrois. On a Tuesday afternoon dedicated solely to trailing a political prisoner on a walk through the middle-class business district, she was wearing full-length form-fitting robes dripping with gold embellishments and elaborate arcane arcs spinning over her head or projected from enchanted embroidery on her shoulders. One hand was pressed delicately over her chest as the other traced artful, practiced gestures in the air, commanding the attention of anyone who might happen to have been paying attention.

“Yes,” Tyrande said finally, with absolutely no inflection. “I can see that.”

“Hush,” replied Valtrois with a smirk. “Weren’t you busy getting lost?”

* * *

Anduin sighed.

“Jaina,” he tried again. “Please.”

After several long moments with no answer, he raised his hand and rapped his gauntleted knuckles against the ice wall filling Jaina’s doorway.

Voice muffled by the barrier, Jaina called, “Go away!”

“I…” Anduin cleared his throat awkwardly. “Jaina, I don’t wish to be rude, but—well, it’s just—”

He’d been trying to convince her to let him into her chambers for the past fifteen minutes. This was getting a little bit ridiculous.

Yes, yes, he supposed technically he _ could _ pull rank as High King of the Alliance and _ order _ her to lower the barrier. The problem was, firstly, that she _ absolutely _would not listen to him, an unfortunate side effect of having been half raised by a woman who was very aware that she was the second most powerful human mage on Azeroth. Having a direct order like that summarily ignored could actually have devastating political consequences for them both, even if it was only in the context of an informal negotiation in the hallway of Stormwind Keep.

Servants talked. Especially when the king did things that were objectively worth gossiping about.

The second consideration was that he wasn’t actually certain she _ was _legally a citizen of the Alliance.

The Kirin Tor were neutral, but she had rejected Dalaran citizenship rather dramatically. Theramore had been technically neutral until Hellscream’s war had forced them thoroughly into the arms of the Alliance, but Theramore was...and so it was entirely likely that Jaina was legally Kul Tiran, and thus outside Anduin’s authority. Except that it was anyone’s guess whether Jaina or Kul Tiras would be more furious at that idea and Jaina was _ entirely _too Kul Tiran for Anduin to want to bring that up within left-hook range.

The third consideration was that she would _ judge _him for it, and Jaina’s judgemental looks could freeze Ragnaros solid.

He considered his arsenal for several minutes, then gave a pathetic sigh.

“Jaina,” he pointed out to the block of ice. “This _ is _ my house.”

“I appreciate your hospitality,” came the muffled response. “Go _ away, _ Anduin.”

“I can’t do that!” He smacked the ice wall to absolutely no effect. “Jaina! The trade laws for New Lordaeron are only a fraction of what needs to be done! The balancing act we’re attempting here is unprecedented, I _ need _you on the Alliance legal team.”

“I don’t want anything to do with it!”

“Will you—Jaina, take this down right now.”

“No.”

“Jaina Proudmoore!”

“Do _ not _ full-name me, Anduin Wrynn, if you think for _ one minute _ I won’t—”

“Help us write the New Lordaeron charter, Jaina.” He rubbed his temples. “I need you. The Alliance needs you.”

_ “The Alliance needs to stop wasting its time on a fool’s errand!” _ Jaina’s voice was clearer now, suggesting she’d gotten up to pace on the other side of the door. “Neutrality with the Horde will not _ work, _ Anduin! It just won’t! Give them an inch and they’ll strangle us with it just like they always have. There is no possible way to create a fair system that both sides will ever agree to abide by!”

“It worked for—”

Anduin snapped his jaw shut with an audible click before he could finish that sentence, but it was too late. It _ had _ worked for Theramore. Theramore’s import-export law, its penal code, its transit and peacekeeping policies, had been the most thorough and reliable in the world. They had been fiercely, meticulously fair.

But he knew better than to—

He recoiled, a bright flare of light his only warning before the ice barrier shattered under the force of a vicious fireball. Most of the spell parted harmlessly around him—Jaina, even at her angriest, would never hurt him on purpose—but not all of it, and he cried out in mingled pain and anger as the fire bit into his upraised arm.

_ “Jaina!” _

“Say it again.”

Carefully, he lowered his arm and looked her in the eye, calm sky blue to crackling heat lightning. He drew himself up and set his shoulders.

“It worked for Theramore,” he said quietly. “It _ did, _ Jaina.”

Jaina’s fury flared white-hot in her eyes, but seemingly against her will they dropped to the arm he was favoring, and she flinched.

“Anduin,” she said. “I...come in, gods, I’m so sorry. I have a healing potion somewhere…”

“It’s fine, Jaina.” It was a superficial wound, and likely wouldn’t even have blistered too badly; as it was, he called on the Light as he passed his uninjured hand over his arm, drawing out the heat and rejuvenating the skin until the pain faded entirely.

“It’s not,” she sighed, stepping back and sinking into her abandoned chair. “Anduin, I’m not doing it. I wash my hands of this. I’m telling you this entire project is a mistake.”

He sat next to her. “Then help us make it work, Jaina. We can’t do it without you.”

“You can’t do it _ with _ me! Lordaeron, Anduin? Lordaeron? You can’t possibly believe—There’s nothing—that kind of trauma—I’m _ done, _ Anduin! I will _ not _ take responsibility for this tragedy in the making. Not this time! If this goes any further, if you actually start creating this system and resettling people, you’re filling graves for good this time. There is nothing _ anyone _ can do that will magically make the survivors of Lordaeron happy to live—” She gave a bitter laugh. “You see? To _ live? _ Alongside the monsters that destroyed their kingdom in the first place."

Anduin knew she could see his heart breaking in his eyes, and tried to hide it for her sake; Jaina was nearly old enough to be his mother, she didn’t need his pity. But he couldn’t quite help it, all the same.

“There was only one monster responsible for the fall of Lordaeron,” he told her. “It wasn’t Sylvanas Windrunner.” He hesitated. “And it wasn’t _ you, _ either.”

She shot him a warning look, but didn’t otherwise respond.

Anduin reached out and placed a hand on her shoulder before standing again.

“I can’t _ order _ you to do the right thing, Jaina,” he said, softly. “I never thought I would have to.”

He was nearly out the door and halfway through a desperate prayer to the Light when she spoke.

“Anduin.”

He stopped, counted to three, and turned around.

She watched him for several long seconds.

“Your father wasn’t nearly this annoying,” she finally decided.

He grinned by reflex. “I learned from the best, Auntie.”

* * *

Tyrande had finally given in and accepted Valtrois’ attempts to casually slip a map of Suramar into her hands.

The map was not helpful. 

(“I am _ not _ being _ punished!” _ Valtrois insisted, voice cracking slightly as it ripped through no less than three octaves in a second. The reagent seller she’d stopped to collect a series of concentrated oils from patted her in a comforting fashion and assured her that of course she wasn’t.)

Was it possible, could it in fact be possible, that Tyrande had somehow forgotten which direction was _ north? _

“No, you’re right,” said Valtrois with atypical patience. She’d reappeared at her charge’s shoulder, peering at the map. An arrow blinked into existence on the enchanted vellum as she pointed and highlighted a section with a gesture. “But _ that _ boulevard is two and a half levels above us. And _ this _ one is actually a canal. If we’re working our way back north, you want to go _ west _ until you find either a staircase or someone willing to let you climb through their upstairs window. Or a telemancy pad.”

“You might indicate these things,” Tyrande said tersely, “on the _ map.” _

Valtrois flung her hands in the air. “It’s not a large area to spend ten thousand years in! No one _ needs _ a map!”

Tyrande had not been in what anyone would describe as a good mood to begin with, and it had gotten worse. She had hoped to distract herself by at least getting fresh air; but the dusky violet tangle of Suramar had quickly become nothing but galling. The very tiles of the street radiated a kind of entitled smugness. A sense of smirking amusement—the haughty assumption that anyone who mattered should simply already know these things, and furthermore that the idea of anyone being such a newcomer as to not understand them intuitively was so offensive that such an individual _ deserved _ to suffer.

Valtrois gave a conciliatory sigh.

“You’re _ hardly _the only one with complaints,” she admitted. “I think Thalyssra considers the city layout a kind of security measure. Especially before we were accepted by the Horde; an alliance of convenience against the Legion might have dissolved at any moment once the threat was dealt with.”

Tyrande did not pin her ears back, but she felt them stiffen.

“Tell me more about that concept,” she said, ice in her voice. Valtrois had the grace to wince.

“She’s planning to have some cartographers work on the issue,” she said, dropping some of her usual dramatics. “The Shal’dorei are...too accustomed to simply assuming we know everything there is to know and so must everyone else.”

“On that we agree.”

Valtrois shot her an annoyed look and seemed about to argue with her when a sudden shout from the canal below them drew her attention.

It drew Tyrande’s as well, an ear swivelling in abject shock before her head had time to snap around. Of all the places in the world to hear it—

The accent was milder than most, an oddly Gilnean twang at the end of almost perfect Stormwind-dialect Common. But it was very clearly _ Draenei. _

And the swearing was Darnassian.

Valtrois, however, didn’t seem surprised in the slightest to see the young Draenei mage walking along the canal bridge. If anything, she seemed surprised that _ Tyrande _seemed surprised.

“There were many Alliance champions in Suramar when, well.” She gestured toward Tyrande in a general acknowledgement of how the attack on Ashenvale had taken even much of the Horde by surprise. “Thalyssra closed the borders to prevent an exodus from turning into a riot.”

Tyrande’s heart was pounding in her ears. “The return of the Alliance citizens trapped in enemy territory was meant to be—”

“Guaranteed by the marriage treaty, _ yes, _ High Priestess.” Valtrois didn’t quite roll her eyes, but she certainly appeared to be thinking about it. “It was, _ kindly _ don’t bite my head off. The borders are only closed in one direction at the moment. Alliance heroes and civilians are perfectly welcome to leave, but only a select few would ever be allowed back in. We’re not willing to expel them by force unless they become an actual security threat. _ That _ one is technically a student of mine.”

“The Draenei?” asked Tyrande as the young woman grappled with the stormcrow on her shoulder. It could not more obviously be a druid, but until she was certain Valtrois knew as well…

Valtrois seemed pleased by Tyrande’s attention to her student. “Hopelessly amateur even by human standards; I gather she has some kind of trauma around magic, and you know I hate to pry.” Ignoring Tyrande’s reaction to that, she continued with a wave of the hand. _ “Fascinating _ creative mind, though. She has a theory about melding musical notation and soundwaves with arcane energy to create more stable casting matrices. I gave her access to my lab to test it, and we’ve got some interesting proof of concept already. That was before the attack, of course,” she added hastily at Tyrande’s suddenly chilly look. “She burned all her notes in the middle of the night as if enchanted harpstrings were going to change the war effort, _ honestly. _ But I respect her integrity. Talent should be nurtured, even if she doesn’t intend to pursue high-level magic.”

“Mmm.” Tyrande’s attempts to protect the druid’s identity were apparently for naught, as the stormcrow had wriggled free of the Draenei’s grip and shifted into a magnificent ten-point stag, bellowing invectives at a Deathguard who’d been passing in the opposite direction.

Valtrois made a disgusted noise. “I don’t suppose you intend to police _your_ people, High Priestess?”

Tyrande’s glare was poison as she stood. “If only to spare them the _ mercy _ of the Duskwatch.”

By the time they reached the pair, a crowd had started to form. A mounted guard, eyes widening as she recognized Tyrande, moved forward with a spear to block her; Valtrois waved the woman off, and she retreated with an expression of abject relief.

“...is that supposed to mean, I know better than to try anything with you? _ I’m an idiot! Ask anyone! _ So say that shit about the Eredar again, go ahead! _ Ash karath!_ Go ahead and see what _ fucking happens!” _

“Levaden,” the Draenei hissed. Tyrande made a mental note—brave, for an amateur mage to stand between a Kaldorei druid and its prey. She wasn’t holding the stag back by magic, either, if the strain in her voice and the way her hooves dug into the stone were any indication. “Let it go.”

_ “Not this time! _ Not from him!”

Valtrois heaved a sigh. “What happened?” she asked the guard with the manasaber. “No, never mind. I think we can guess. Break them up! What are you being paid for?” Belatedly, she remembered herself and glanced at Tyrande. “Gently.”

The guard saluted and urged her cat around, stepping between the mounted Deathguard and the druid. The Forsaken looked impassive; the stag reared but couldn’t strike out for fear of hitting her companion, settling for a wild bugle as she slammed her hooves back onto the stone.

“That’s enough,” the guard said loudly. Satisfied that the druid was under control, she rounded on the Deathguard. “I’ve had just about enough of you. Representative of the Warchief or no, you are no less a guest of Suramar than any other. We take our peace seriously here. If I hear about you starting fights again, you will be removed from the city. And as a word of advice—if you intend to throw stones, you ought to be careful what kind of house you’re standing in.”

The Forsaken, after staring at her for a long moment, turned away.

The druid’s eyes narrowed.

Tyrande was just about to do something after all—this was a stupid fight to risk a young warrior’s safety over, and she would rather have the young woman bide her time at her own order than be disciplined by the Nightborne. She was just a moment too slow.

“What’s _ that _ supposed to mean?” the druid—Levaden, her friend had called her—demanded.

The guard turned to smile grimly at her. “Lobbing insults about the eredar is foolish for their kind. I have no doubt your friend could have made some choice comments about the Scourge in return, if she wanted.”

Dark eyes flashed as Levaden drew herself up and took a slow step forward, then another. Slowly and with derisive intent, she snorted into the guard’s face.

“I don’t know what _ your _ problem is with Forsaken,” she growled, tossing wicked antlers in a way that drove the guard back half a step and away from the Deathguard. “But you better lose it fast. He’s got just as much right to be here as you. And if _ you’re _ throwing stones, the Forsaken endured everything Suramar was too scared to face, and _ they _ still had the guts to stand and _ fight _while the world was ending!”

There was a pause.

“That was quick,” said Valtrois under her breath.

Tyrande cleared her throat. The stag glanced dismissively her way, then did a nearly comical double-take, massive hooves skidding on the smooth paving stones as she scrambled back behind her Draenei companion and shifted back to her elven form in consternation.

“Your loyalties,” Tyrande said mildly. “They _ fascinate _me.”

Behind her, she heard Valtrois loudly shooing the gathered crowd along; the Deathguard spared Levaden a quizzical look before melting back into the throng. 

Levaden’s shoulders were up around her twitching ears. Tyrande, now that she could get a proper look at the girl, felt her heart twist. The druid had obviously been young; seeing her face, she became _ painfully _so. Not a child, not so young that it was alarming to think she was an adventurer; but young enough. Young enough that it would not have been odd to see her still in training, young enough that no commander in their right mind would have allowed her to reinforce Ashenvale. Young enough that she would have wanted to fight anyway.

She muttered something; the Draenei squeezed her elbow, and she cleared her throat.

“I don’t like bullies,” she managed. “Sorry, High Priestess. I didn’t mean—I’m sorry. It’s, um—this wasn’t how I wanted to meet you. Ma’am.”

Despite herself, Tyrande couldn’t help but smile. This angry, uncertain young thing was the first Kaldorei she had spoken to in too long; and she shrank away as if expecting Tyrande to be angry with her for some reason. 

Valtrois twitched at her elbow; the crowds she had not entirely succeeded in dispersing, the guards, and the rippling awareness of Tyrande’s presence had her visibly on edge.

A petty side of Tyrande didn’t much care and thought Valtrois could deal with it; the rest of her was wiser. This was not the time to press their luck.

_ “Ishnu-alah, _ young one,” she said, briefly squeezing the young woman’s shoulder and nodding to the Draenei whose gentle touch on Levaden’s shoulder suggested more than friendship. “May we next meet under better circumstances.”

The suddenly tongue-tied Levaden gave an eager nod before curling in on herself again; Tyrande opened her mouth to give the poor thing a blessing, but Valtrois had already taken her elbow; with a snap of the arcanist’s fingers, the canal vanished in a flare of light.

Telemancy was even more disconcerting than traditional portals; the Nighthold took shape around them with jarring suddenness, and Tyrande yanked her arm free in a sudden flare of pique as a sense of loss welled up sharp and cruel.

Valtrois looked pained. For a moment, Tyrande almost thought she was about to apologize; but she merely sighed again and walked away.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I will find the Blizzard devs responsible for the fucking Suramar City map/lack thereof, and I will KILL THEM.
> 
> (I'm really excited about Jaina's subplot with Lordaeron!)
> 
> If any of you crazy people want to see my meta about oceanic currents in Azeroth for some ungodly reason it's [here](https://wowerehouse.tumblr.com/post/188571246458/wowerehouse-mylordshesacactus-okay-here-it).


	7. Outlanders

Tyrande refused to be grateful.

Neither she nor Thalyssra was a fool. Any agreements between them were bribes, any kindnesses could only be a method of control. Such a statement was not even a reflection on the First Arcanist’s intent or character; it was simply the truth. 

Nevertheless, she was capable of appreciating moments of comfort when they arrived.

Tyrande was  _ acutely  _ aware that her mail was being read in both directions. It would take phenomenal stupidity to write down anything incriminating, and there was no chance that so much as a whisper of any rebellion would ever cross her desk.

(Metaphorically speaking. Thalyssra had awkwardly offered to have one set up for her, but Tyrande had refused. She had neither any interest in anything so permanent, nor enough paperwork to justify it. She preferred to make do with a side table and a drawing board and ignored Thalyssra’s mild exasperation at her stubbornness.)

Even censored with a fine-toothed comb, however, the messages were a balm.

Shandris wrote her religiously from Stormwind, at least three times a week. She was stressed and unhappy, but seemed to be bearing up well. Tyrande had been given little choice; of  _ course _ she had left General Feathermoon in command of their scattered people in Stormwind, before that mockery of a wedding. That it had served a dual purpose of keeping Shandris from having to watch had been a coincidence. The Kaldorei needed a leader who was able to be with them.

Entire blocks of text arrived magically erased for some reason or another, but the cross-factional censors in their  _ gracious wisdom _ allowed most of the personal correspondence to pass unscathed.

In truth, Tyrande knew it was unfair to resent the censors too much; she was well aware that exactly half of them were Alliance and trying to shield Tyrande herself from any justification Windrunner might find to restrict her even further. That, and preventing any information from falling into the hands of the Horde that might provide a tactical advantage.

Not that Shandris would be foolish enough to put such things on paper in the first place.

Tyrande was in agony in the meantime, frequently unable to resist asking how the Kaldorei in exile were coping; but the answers were always censored.

Thalyssra had told her, quietly, that Horde intelligence reports said the night elves were welcomed and their status primarily stable. It was her opinion that such reports were being censored so that, should hints of discontent ever begin to arise, Tyrande would not be tipped off to the shifting wind by positive reports suddenly ceasing to flow.

It was very likely she spoke the truth. Tyrande did not particularly care. She wanted something  _ certain, _ some reassurance.

Some contact with her people that was  _ more  _ than five seconds of talking down an angry adolescent druid.

She closed her eyes against the ache it caused, seeing that familiar handwriting and knowing it would be years if not decades, if  _ ever, _ that she was able to see Shandris again. She no longer had any strength or inclination to pretend Shandris Feathermoon was anything but her daughter. After a few instances of trial and error, feeling out the limits of their frustrating constraints, they had settled into a tentative holding pattern.

Yes, it was frustrating and insulting that they were unable to discuss the one thing that meant the most to them. But Shandris was the only family Tyrande had left. It was pathetically comforting, the things they were allowed to share. 

_ Stay safe. Be strong. I’ve asked to be allowed to see you and I’ll keep you updated. Tell King Wrynn that he would be better served negotiating for trade than direct lumber rights. I love you. I miss you. This will not last forever. _

The trade advice, oddly, had been allowed to go through. No answer had ever been given to Tyrande’s promise of change in the future. Apparently, the Horde did not approve.

Genn wrote at least twice a month; Mia Greymane wrote once a week, and her letters were almost entirely uncensored compared to the disjointed fractions of surviving sentences Tyrande opened with amusement from the king. A few times she had clearly slipped up in some way, but for the most part they were simple recitations of open knowledge. The events themselves were not new information—Anduin always sent copies of his own notes and reports, complete with wishes for her happiness and inquiries after her health. But there were stark differences between official summaries from the King of Stormwind, and Queen Greymane’s brightly humorous accounts of the inconsequential petty rivalries she’d witnessed.

Some days a vividly accurate description of her husband and the Warchief fighting like cats and dogs, and the wry note that any day now Anduin was going to start spraying them both with a water hose to break them up, was the only thing that could make Tyrande laugh.

This week contained an unexpected treasure—a lengthy, completely intact missive in Anduin’s hand, signed only with his name and no titles, asking for her advice. It was becoming obvious that the Kaldorei, like the worgen, were going to become a permanent fixture in Stormwind. But Stormwind was still a human culture; the forests were tame and well-managed, the city clean and open but still a place of hard stone and stark walls. And there were no end of chapels and a grand cathedral for the worship of the Light, but while worgen and Draenei might be happy with such things...

_ If you have any ideas, High Priestess,  _ he wrote,  _ I would be grateful to hear them. I know I would be the wrong person to try to incorporate the worship of Elune into Stormwind’s existing culture; your goddess is a stranger to me, and it’s not my place. But I will not allow the Kaldorei to feel unwelcome here. If I were cut off from Stormwind, I would find great comfort in knowing the Light had not forsaken me; I  _ must _ find some way to ensure your people can take that same comfort. They need to feel the presence of Elune now more than ever. I owe them much more than that. _

_ PS: Jaina has been muttering a lot of things in Thalassian around me recently. I realize that Darnassian is a very different language, but as you have better access to sin’dorei than I do at the moment, I wonder if you would be willing to discreetly have these phrases translated? I’m certain they’re impolite. _

Unable to suppress her fondness, Tyrande laughed softly as she glanced through the transcriptions. Across the room, Thalyssra glanced up. Tyrande ignored her.

_ Anduin, _ she replied, jotting it down on a clean sheet of paper.

_ I wish to express my gratitude for your letter. My thoughts and my blessing are enclosed, but firstly allow me to address your second question.  _

_ “Kim’jael” is best translated as “little rat,” which begs the question of what in the goddess’ name you said to the Lady Proudmoore. The third phrase is similar enough in construction to Darnassian that I am comfortable guessing at a translation. It would certainly be considered culturally insensitive, as it is a fairly clear threat to strangle you and perform experimental necromancy for the sole purpose of doing so a second time. _

_ Ande’thoras-ethil. I shall enquire as to the rest. _

For now, she set the reply aside; it would require thought and prayer, communion with her goddess, to provide a true answer.

Her gaze sharpened as she slit open the next envelope and withdrew the contents.

_ Finally. _

Commander Summermoon’s field reports would, of course, be the next best thing to useless. It seemed the young Sentinel had a gift for this kind of thing, however—or, more likely, that she had been closely watched by a Horde commander in writing an acceptable report in the first place, and thus avoided censorship.

Tyrande opened her mouth to confirm with Thalyssra that it was Saurfang who currently oversaw the occupation of Darnassus, then firmly closed it again.

She had other avenues of information. There was no need to encourage the First Arcanist into thinking they had  _ any _ form of partnership.

There was nothing of real substance—but there was more substance than Tyrande had gotten in a month. At least according to a missive written under obvious duress, there had been only minor incidents, and nothing that triggered any Horde retribution protocols under the treaty. Several underground resistance leaders had been located and the majority captured alive; Summermoon did not know what had been done with them. One Horde soldier had been publicly disciplined; another had been removed from Teldrassil and replaced when her comrades overheard her making concerning comments about the treatment of prisoners.

_ The Sisterhood of Elune has largely been scattered, _ Summermoon reported.  _ The Warchief declared that their resistance in the Temple proves the priestesses are too volatile to be permitted to gather in numbers. All arms and armor are banned from their presence. Many of the new locations are outside the Tree, so while they correspond regularly and say they are unharmed I have not seen them personally since they were removed. _

That was nearly seditious; but apparently it skirted just under the line. That...was actually a comfort. It suggested the Horde had no reason to worry that Tyrande might pursue the question of her priestesses’ safety.

Which was no reason to take it on faith.  _ Note, _ she scribbled on a nearby pad.  _ Send Ravenwing to Ashenvale, make contact with captive sisters. _ The list of living elven champions was short enough already; Yukale Ravenwing was part of an even shorter ledger of kaldorei who had managed to get clear of the tree when it became obvious that Darnassus was lost. And much as Tyrande hated to send  _ any  _ of her free people near the Horde, a kaldorei rogue in Ashenvale was safer than almost any other creature in the world.

And she had to know.

“Is that Summermoon?” Thalyssra asked with extremely forced casualness.

Tyrande read carefully through the last line—an exhausted confirmation that Moonglade had been closed off from the Emerald Dream in order to allow the Circle to retain its neutrality, and Horde druids now took shifts in the barrow dens to patrol Teldrassil from the Dream with kaldorei spies facing a penalty of death—before she responded.

“Would it be another?”

For some reason, Thalyssra’s calm non-reaction irritated her. “I’ve told Saurfang that I’d like you to be receiving copies of the Horde reports. I know he genuinely doesn’t intend anything… dishonorable, he would say...so, save for actual operational details, I see no reason you shouldn’t know as much as I do. I have a field report here about the arrest of a young priestess in Darkshore that I’m certain Delaryn Summermoon isn’t cleared to pass along to you, if you’d like to see it.”

Tyrande’s head snapped up before she could control herself. Thalyssra smiled and held out a single sheet of orc-sized paper.

That smile only ratcheted Tyrande’s anger tighter. No doubt it was intended to be kind and reassuring. It was  _ condescending. _ A magnanimous gesture from her captor, nearly gloating, callously rubbing it in Tyrande’s face how tenuous her access to precious, desperately-needed information truly was.

The Kaldorei lived or died on Horde whims; and Tyrande herself would know as much or as little as the First Arcanist deigned to share with her.

If even something as close to her heart as this could be handed over as a reward for good behavior, the threat could not be clearer. Anything given could be taken away. The Horde was only obligated to share with Tyrande that correspondence which was not deemed a security risk. And Sylvanas Windrunner had poison in her silver tongue.  _ Anything _ could be deemed a security risk, if Tyrande proved enough of an irritation.

But she could not refuse the paltry offering, nonetheless, and she reached out silently to accept the paper—gently and without so much as a cutting glare. It burned like felfire in her blood.

Her heart rate spiked as she read through the cool, detached report. The priestess was very young, barely more than an acolyte. She had been accused of smuggling reports for the resistance; Forsaken guards had immediately removed her from the area to secure her in Orgrimmar while she was investigated. The arrest report was over a week old—but in that time it had acquired several amendments. 

The girl had been returned to the Temple of the Moon by now. She had been imprisoned underground and interrogated, which was harrowing enough for a moon priestess barely of legal age; but not tortured. The “coded messages” and trinkets she had been ferrying between strange elves had been family tokens and snippets from love poems, passed through several hands on their way from Stormwind to those imprisoned in the tree. Eventually, even Sylvanas Windrunner had been satisfied that there had been no rebellious intent.

The Darkshore posting had been swapped with an older priestess possessing better judgement; in fact, all priestesses had immediately been removed from their postings and shuffled to break any chain of communication they might have been part of. The acolyte had been dragged before the Warchief for the talking-to of her life, and then released into the custody of the Sisterhood. She was, by all accounts, traumatized; but Elune had guided her home, and would heal her soul in good time.

Tyrande still felt ill. The girl had been very,  _ very _ lucky. If even  _ one _ of those messages had been more than it appeared…

“I’ll have some of my agents keep an eye on her,” Thalyssra said as Tyrande folded the report again. “To ensure she doesn’t quietly disappear. ”

That rankled. It was an irrational reaction, even cruel; but she could no more have suppressed it than stopped the sun from rising. “The Sisterhood is capable of protecting our own,” Tyrande snapped.

Finally, she appeared to have gotten under Thalyssra’s skin; those long, elegant ears stiffened angrily. “And they could use all the help they can get. They’re hardly a fighting force at the moment.”

For a moment they glared at each other. Hissing with irritation, Thalyssra broke first and turned back to her reports.

Tyrande had the grace to be at least somewhat ashamed. “It was well-meant.”

Thalyssra dipped her head in acknowledgement. “She’s either the most thorough prodigy of a spy I’ve ever heard of, in which case she earned her victory; or she’s a young idiot who doesn’t deserve to die for it.”

“There’s a lot of that going around,” Tyrande muttered under her breath.

Thalyssra laughed; a pleasant, musical sound that stabbed at Tyrande’s core. This was all  _ academic _ to her, wasn’t it? “So I heard. She’s fine, if you were wondering—your young druid from the other day. The Deathguard wanted her arrested and sent to Darnassus—”

“You have _ no right—” _

_ “Which would be flagrantly illegal and a violation of treaty law,” _ Thalyssra interrupted her interruption loudly. Tyrande flicked her ears back and fell silent. “And the more  _ reasonable _ of the Dark Rangers in the city politely suggested I expel her to Stormwind if she was going to create trouble. Fortunately I found her records.” 

She pushed back from her desk, opening a low drawer and withdrawing a slim pink folder which she leaned over and tossed onto Tyrande’s side table. 

“Levaden Mountaincall. Much like Valtrois, her numerous personality defects are made up for in her history of service. She was a front-line infiltrator for the rebellion,” she translated. “It would take more than an entirely provoked argument in the street to justify banishing a young hero who risked her neck for Suramar. I remember her now, actually. Clumsy and impossible to command—but fearless. I’m  _ positive _ I was never that young.” 

Against her will, Tyrande smiled.

Encouraged, Thalyssra pointed toward the folder. _ “That _ one was noteworthy mostly for not officially existing. She just came attached to her young mage, and I don’t believe the pair of them ever completed a single mission to the letter without a chaperone. I’d throw a glamour on the draenei and send them out for bread and milk and they’d come back with bread, milk, eggs, a cask of arcwine and a demon skull. A two-hour mission to activate a telemancy pad and they’d do it, certainly, and then they’d see some Duskwatch traitor about to beat a civilian…”

Given what Tyrande had seen of Levaden’s protectiveness alone, she could imagine the chaos. She didn’t appreciate Thalyssra’s exasperation, but for now she would let it slide.

At least the First Arcanist seemed somewhat appreciative. “They freed about three dozen Legion captives in a night, once. Mind you, they were  _ meant _ to be delivering a single message, but I can hardly fault them. Levaden in particular tended to overhear things that were fairly time-sensitive. Suramar had barely figured out to be wary of stormcrows that seemed a bit too interested in them. No one would ever have stopped their canalside conversations because there was a  _ dolphin _ nearby.”

“Dolphins are rare,” Tyrande observed as she flipped through the thin dossier. “Malfurion…”

Her throat tightened before she could finish. Malfurion had always suspected that the intelligence of whales and dolphins—so close to that of the kaldorei, but fundamentally different, and not sapient like the moonkin who could actively coach or gift their form to a druid—made the transformation difficult to pin down compared to the more common seals and sea lions. He himself had never been able to slip into a dolphin’s skin, though Tyrande was certain he could have if he had tried; he preferred the calmer and simpler seal. 

Those who were seafarers by nature often acquired such a form, and younger even than Levaden—Mother Moon, the girl was barely three hundred and fifty,  _ that  _ explained a great deal. But it  _ was  _ odd, for such a young druid with no ties to the sea and absolutely no Darnassian record of formal training outside a list of complaints by every single one of her teachers for less than a year of initiate instruction. 

It spoke of...a longing, perhaps. A playfulness and ingenuity, problem-solving creativity and a willingness to laugh, but also perhaps a drive to escape. A protector of drowning sailors and the potential for cruelty, as well; the intelligence to act out of  _ spite  _ that most creatures lacked.

A creature of contradictions. 

“Self-taught,” was all she said out loud. “At a young age.”

“Her control over her transformations isn’t terribly reliable, I gather,” said Thalyssra, gracefully pretending Tyrande’s moment of choked emotion hadn’t happened. “Very emotion-based. I once heard another druid describe her style as archaic, though I’m not certain what that means.”

“Non-Cenarion,” Tyrande said absently. “Greater depth of command over the form, but also greater vulnerability. The moment a druid loses congruence with the base force—when they cease to be as one with... what a  _ nightsaber _ thinks it means to be a nightsaber, for instance, and become simply a kaldorei wearing a nightsaber’s shape—they lose the transformation until congruence is regained. The same applies to the use of spells; only the Cenarion method allows a druid to commune with and  _ guide _ natural forces, without  _ becoming  _ them. Congruence-based druidry is...discouraged. A wild, unreliable practice, that creates powerful connection but poor results. It is a great deal more difficult, for little reward.”

The kind of thing pursued only by...wild, fiercely emotional individuals incapable of being told what to do, completely unsuited for the peace and meditation of Cenarius’ teachings, who would find the slowness and focus on natural order, the Dream, the sedate pace of the trees, a grating torment. 

Ninety-nine percent of the time, such individuals were simply drawn to the ranks of the Sentinels.  _ Most _ people did not go off and turn themselves into deer out of pique.

Thalyssra looked pleased with herself for having turned the tide of the conversation. 

“I was glad we were able to keep her,” she commented. “A young rank-and-file firebrand is good for the shal’dorei. Especially those who don’t want outlanders permitted within the city at all.”

Tyrande, who had set the folder aside in favor of slitting open another censored report from Darnassus, froze. Thalyssra did not notice.

“It reminds us that other factions are made of people,” she said, “not simply abstract armies. And many will still listen to  _ her  _ defense of others when they would never accept such a correction from anyone further removed from our race. Of course, even  _ I _ can only work so much magic. If it happens again I really will have to ask her to leave; I’m not certain why she stays at all, except that we know her lover is a spy. They are not...subtle. At least not by the standards of Suramar spycraft, which I will admit—” 

_ “Outlanders?” _

Tyrande’s voice snapped like black ice, like the hiss of a whip in the moments before the crack, like the last fragile thread of her patience.

Thalyssra somehow failed to hear the razorblade on her tongue. “It’s not a  _ slur, _ Tyrande,” she said testily. “It only means you’re not—”

“I assure you that I  _ am!” _

The First Arcanist held her hands up in surrender. “I  _ know!  _ I know. I misspoke. I take it you won’t find some way to twist it into an insult when I say our cultures have  _ diverged somewhat.” _

_ “One _ culture has diverged,  _ First Arcanist, _ while the other did nothing whatsoever. Where you get the  _ gall.  _ This was my home!”

“Tyrande,” Thalyssra said, voice infuriatingly even but finally beginning to carry some of the wariness Tyrande wanted from her. “Put...that’s close enough, now let’s just...talk about this calmly like rational— _ Tyrande, put the knife down.” _

“What?!” Tyrande started, then glanced down at the letter opener still clenched in her hand. Incredulous, she raised the dull silver blade, pressed it against her left palm, and sliced harshly downward; it stung but left no more than a scratch. Ignoring the interruption, she raged, “Suramar is my  _ home! _ And after all the blood we shed, the agony I endured—that we all endured, every moment of the War, in its defense—we returned to find ourselves warded off with a magical barrier like biting gnats from a garden party! And now you have the  _ audacity  _ to call me an outsider. Worse, to make me  _ believe  _ it.”

“We had no idea you were even alive,” Thalyssra snapped. “Every child in Suramar grows up hearing of the rebellion as a cautionary tale! Courageous fools or foolish heroes, depending on the source, but we knew for a fact that you were dead—that you had failed because no one could stand against the Legion! Do you  _ need _ me to say once more that we were wrong? Will that be enough for you?”

“It will be  _ enough  _ for me when this miserable city is ground to ruins with the rest of the Horde, for its complicity,” Tyrande hissed.

“Oh, spoken like a true child of Suramar!  _ However _ could I have thought you no longer considered us to be members of the same people!”

Tyrande was far past caring about Thalyssra’s tender feelings, if she had ever been inclined to it.  _ “Ten thousand years _ I have defended this world and Suramar along with it, watching for the Legion’s return, waiting and preparing so that when that dread day arrived we would be able to finish them. Ten thousand  _ years _ while you stagnated in a prison of your own cowardice and numbed the sting of your betrayals with orgies and wine tastings only to beg for our aid when your denial caught up to you—and be  _ granted _ it!”

Tyrande’s voice cut off sharply, anger closing her throat. Thalyssra was on her feet now; Tyrande gave a soft hiss before she could interrupt.

“I told you once,” she said, low and deadly, “that I would give you a chance to show your true colors. One chance, First Arcanist.  _ You used it well.” _

“Oh, shut up,” snapped Thalyssra. “We would have spent the next ten thousand years with you looking down at us. Having to earn your approval of our existence. Whatever  _ you  _ may think of them, my people deserve better than that.”

“You have most certainly proven yourselves.” Tyrande didn’t bother hiding her disdain; she had burned too hot, too quickly, when she knew better; she called on the blessing of Elune now, taking that fire and turning it cold. But she couldn’t make herself all ice, not now; a hot flame of hatred still flickered in her chest and she no longer had the strength to contain it. “If I could trade every shal’dorei life I saved in your service for  _ one  _ more night with my husband, you would deserve no better from me.”

_ “What choice did you give me?!” _

Tyrande’s eyebrows nearly leapt off her face at Thalyssra’s sudden, explosive anger; but the shal’dorei was suddenly not above using her height to her advantage, crowding into Tyrande’s personal space like it would intimidate her instead of opening up a thousand deadly targets if Tyrande had only been holding a real knife. As it was, she flipped the letter opener in her hand and pressed it hard against the First Arcanist’s kidney, earning a brief twitch of pain as the other woman conveniently decided she’d gotten close enough.

“Of the two of us, you ask what choice  _ you _ were given?” For good measure, Tyrande ground the dull blade in further.

Pushed past her own limit, Thalyssra slapped the pathetic weapon to the ground with strength belied by her soft robes and shoved Tyrande back half a step.  _ “I had no right _ to decide what was best for the kaldorei! Do you think I don’t understand what we owe you? I had no right! The moment you agreed to—how could I refuse? On what grounds?”

Thalyssra stepped back, rubbing her hands over her faintly glowing markings. She gave a sigh so exhausted that it brought Tyrande’s own bone-deep tiredness leaking to the surface, like unwanted weeds responding to sunlight.

“You believed it would protect your people,” Thalyssra said. “A people I know very well I abandoned twice over. I stand by both of those decisions; I did what I thought was right with the information I had. But I  _ know  _ you suffered for both of them. I stood to lose nothing but my pride, and I was meant to say  _ no? _ You agreed. I respected your decision. I’m done being blamed for it. Get out.”

“That is easier said than done,” Tyrande reminded her with a gesture at the layers of warding, her own anger not lessened in the least but the flames burning lower. “We will speak of this again.”

“I cannot wait.” Thalyssra’s voice was hard, but the sag of her ears spoke to more complicated emotions as she turned back to her work.

Tyrande’s eyes narrowed; but she turned and left.


	8. Administration

Hooves rang off the well-worn cobblestones as their retinue trotted down a main thoroughfare. 

Carts rattled on the uneven streets, startling cats and children out of their path. Hammers fell nearly constantly in the background, egged on by the occasional shouted order by a work crew’s coordinator. It was the beginning of fall, just far enough in the year to carry a hint of crispness in the air and to fill street stalls with fresh vegetables. An assortment of flags warred for dominance on the walls and hanging in open windows.

And Jaina held a hissed argument with her king while they both tried to pretend otherwise.

“This is a waste of time,” she whispered yet again. “I’m here to go over treaty law, not as a tourist.”

“Whether you like it or not, you need to see the reality of what we’re building. Besides,” Anduin replied out of the side of his mouth as their guide slowed her charger to a walk and led them down a secondary road. “We wouldn’t want you to get lost, Jaina.”

“I know Lordaeron,” Jaina responded coldly. “I don’t need to see it again.”

The paladin leading them along preempted Anduin’s response.

“Aye, Lady Proudmoore,” she said casually. “But ye knew it as it  _ was. _ Some of the renovations might come as a surprise.”

Embarrassed to have been caught out so easily, Jaina winced and dipped her head.

“I don’t...particularly want to,” she said. “I would prefer to focus on the task at hand rather than a sightseeing tour.”

Rinda Broadstone made a sympathetic expression but didn’t show any signs of pity. The stout, middle-aged dwarven paladin wasn’t a poor choice for a city watch officer; Jaina had vague memories of her taking command of a district battalion in the aftermath of the Purge, and her record had shown similar minor-but-not-inconsequential commands in Pandaria, on Draenor, during the Legion invasion...Never major commands, rarely even under a champion's direct leadership, but somehow always on hand when someone reliable was needed in the background. And she seemed to be acclimating just fine here, as well. 

In truth, Jaina found her presence reassuring. She had...grown sour, on paladins. But Rinda was the kind of calm, levelheaded, easygoing middle-rank officer that made Azeroth function as if they’d been molded by the gods for that very purpose. There had to be thousands like her, and Anduin had gone through them with a fine-toothed comb to find the ones who had no aversion to the Forsaken.

Rinda was also a halfway decent actress, because until now she’d been doing a  _ phenomenal _ job at pretending she hadn’t noticed anything going on behind her.

She didn’t react with offense, but neither did she seem apologetic at all. She simply shortened her reins, giving her war ram a half-check until they had fallen back between Jaina and Anduin rather than in front.

“I know, lass,” she murmured, ignoring Jaina’s brief irritated look; Rinda couldn’t be more than a year or two older than her, if she wasn’t younger. “But ye’ll find this  _ is _ the task at hand. Look there, now.” She lifted a hand and pointed at what appeared to be a completely random set of broken-down storefronts.

“I see it.” Jaina didn’t bother keeping the edge from her voice. “Blight scarring. It could be a hundred years before that’s able to be removed, if ever. I told you. I’m perfectly familiar with the city, if we could wrap this up.”

Rinda hesitated. “Na, Jaina. Not that.”

“A cloth merchant?” Anduin guessed.

Rinda gave a seated half-bow. “That’d be it, lad. Run by a Josef Gregorian, man transferred his whole life from Undercity.”

Jaina snorted softly at her choice of words.

“None o’that, now,” Rinda told her firmly, then moved on before Jaina could respond. “Gregorian’s one o’ the best in the business; Forsaken blue-purple’s a hard color to dye, so the man would’ve had to be. An’ he’s set in his ways, now, aye? Knows his trade and has his dyeing operation set up jus’ so. Complains the ugly off a kodo’s backside if you touch it.”

“What of it?” asked Anduin, sounding—bless his naive heart—genuinely curious.

Rinda pointed again, this time slightly to the left. “What’s he next to, lad?”

Anduin squinted at the sign. He had to twist slightly in his saddle, as they continued down the street; his stallion was a deeply patient animal who put up with it for some reason.

“Reagent trade,” Jaina answered after a cursory glance over her shoulder. “Why?”

“Because tha’s a residential store,” Rinda answered quietly. “An’ the Osbournes are living human.”

Jaina tensed; under her, the little sorrel mare she’d borrowed from the Stormwind stables shifted restlessly. “There’s been trouble already?”

“Settle,” Rinda ordered her. Jaina’s eyes narrowed. “No trouble aside what you’d expect from warring neighbors. But now see, this is why we need ye. The preliminary charter’s  _ bad, _ Proudmoore. It was only ever meant to be a starting place, aye? Now one ironclad law says, Gregorian’s Forsaken an’ we can’t penalize Forsaken practices in their own space, so the man’s got a right to run ‘is business as he sees fit. But  _ another  _ ironclad law says Forsaken cannae make places uninhabitable to the living, unless they’re private for Forsaken as laid out in the charter. So now tell me, Jaina—what do we do, when Gregorian’s got boilin’ vials of toxic dye, waftin’ fumes into the Osbournes’ store an’ apartments?”

Jaina opened her mouth, then closed it. “Well,” she said, slowly. “It stands to reason that if his actions are adversely affecting others outside his designated space, then...but it would have to be worded carefully, or it would open the door to either becoming unenforceable, or being rife for abuse. It seems as if temporal precedence...but how you would prove...Hmm.”

Rinda inclined her head with a ‘you see’ gesture; Anduin rubbed a nonexistent beard in a very bad attempt to cover up a smile.

“Shut up,” Jaina told him. Then, “I’ll think about it.”

* * *

Tyrande was curled in a window seat in the library.

It was not, by any stretch of the imagination, an ideal place to go through her mail; but she was sick to death of sitting quietly across from Thalyssra, playacting domestic peace. It was bad enough they shared a room, it was almost more than she could bear that they shared a bed. She would  _ not _ spend any more time in teeth-clenched cooperation with that woman.

The library door opened. She ignored it.

She had already sorted through the letters from Stormwind. Mia and young Anduin were a refreshing dose of normalcy; but she took a special comfort in Genn’s letters, censored almost to incoherence though they might be.

He was angry. He made no attempt to hide it. That in itself was keeping her sane; for all the comfort she took in being able to find a new normal in most of her reports, Genn alone reminded her that she was allowed to hold burning fury in her chest. That she wasn’t mad for not simply moving on.

At the moment, she was crafting a response to Commander Summermoon. The young Sentinel had, cautiously, begun inserting requests for advice and guidance into her missives. To Tyrande’s surprise, the questions had arrived intact and uncensored. She had grown used to the ability to advise Shandris from afar; the Horde had very limited authority to control the Alliance’s governing of its own people, which was very much what they would be doing. 

But Delaryn Summermoon was a surprise. To be sure, Tyrande’s replies would no doubt have to pass Sylvanas Windrunner’s personal inspection; but that might not be an insurmountable problem.

The issue this week was regarding fishing and hunting around Teldrassil. The Horde had a garrison to feed and importing supplies was expensive; but Saurfang by all accounts was aware that the kaldorei, who could not leave and whose imports were all but entirely controlled by the Horde, needed to be given claim over the natural resources of the tree. Summermoon’s concern was how to handle poaching both by night elves and the Horde. Teldrassil was rich in resources, but had never been forced to sustain a large captive population before.

Thus far, tensions had been kept under control; but Horde occupation or no, Darnassus was  _ Tyrande’s _ city to lead.

_ I concur with Lord Saurfang,  _ she wrote carefully. Technically, Saurfang had not actually said anything of the sort, at least not to her; but it was implied, and this was the only way Windrunner would ever allow the next sentence to go through unaltered.  _ Horde poachers must be dealt with by Horde discipline, as our own poachers must be dealt with by our own peacekeepers and none other; and that discipline must be both formalized and considerably more severe than any consequences facing the kaldorei.  _

_ A possible solution to the greater problem, however, may lie in joint hunting and fishing parties. Allowing small groups of both kaldorei and Horde hunters to take advantage of what game remains in Darkshore, and what fish are left in the area, would avoid the Warchief’s security concerns and allow the occupiers to ‘blow off steam’, as it were, and the kaldorei to feed themselves more reliably. _

It galled her to write the calm recommendation. But her own anger could only run unchecked in private. In questions of policy and action, Tyrande had no right to give her people anything but her most rational judgement.

_ I have faith in your insights and good sense, and do not desire to cut you out of the chain of communication. However, if the High Overlord ever wishes to consult me directly, I hope you will indicate to him that it is not as if he does not know where I may be found. _

_ Ishnu-alah, Sentinel. You serve our people well. _

She folded the letter to seal later, and picked up a rough draft of her current message for Stormwind to begin editing.

“She is  _ trying, _ you know.”

Tyrande didn’t look up. “Arcanist Valtrois.”

Valtrois sighed.

“You don’t think this is getting a  _ bit _ ridiculous? I’m something of an  _ expert  _ on the subject of excessive dramatics, you know.”

Tyrande looked up and quirked an eyebrow.

Valtrois rolled her eyes. “You haven’t spoken in a week and it’s giving me a headache. Come with me.”

Tyrande’s eyebrows lifted of their own free will this time, and there was suddenly very little humor in it. “I think not.”

“Oh, for pity’s—I’m not taking you to Thalyssra! Are you satisfied, High Priestess? Now come with me. I’m trying to help you. I’m also trying not to be demoted back to initiate for neglecting you. Now will you  _ please _ at least come downstairs with me so that I can tell the First Arcanist I took you somewhere?”

Tyrande’s inclination was to ignore her again; but in truth, she was close to losing her mind from the isolation and stone walls. She was not able to leave the Nighthold without Valtrois; and she would be damned if she asked permission to storm off after her fight with Thalyssra, which meant she had been unable to request her escort.

Valtrois looked legitimately relieved when Tyrande stood, but hid it behind her usual haughtiness. “There. Was that so hard? Come on.”

Valtrois strode like she had a destination in mind; Tyrande bit her tongue to control her own irritation at padding after the woman like a puppy. Was she this desperate for a change in scenery? Valtrois was probably just going to the kitchens to fetch something elaborate and sugary that would make Tyrande gag. And since when, precisely, did she care about Valtrois’ career goals?

A wave of disgust filled her. She was moments from spitting out the bile on her tongue when her erstwhile guide finally pushed open a thick door.

Valtrois crossed her arms, looking satisfied with herself. “It’s not much,” she acknowledged. “But if ever there was a woman who needed to blow off some steam, High Priestess…”

Tyrande’s fingers clenched involuntarily.

It  _ wasn’t _ much, not in the grand scheme of things; a training salle was the farthest imaginable cry from the forest work Tyrande craved, and an insult to her level of ability besides. But as a facility, it was...impressive.

And outdoors. A faint violet shimmer in the air indicated there were wards to prevent any wayward arrows from arcing out over the cliff and striking unfortunate sailors, but other than that, the only wall was the inner mirror-lined entrance connecting the salle to the Nighthold proper. The rest was open to the air, all pillars and arches. Arcane archery targets in a range of sizes hovered awaiting activation.

Valtrois reached past her and plucked a bladeless hilt from a weapons rack. In her hand, it immediately expanded into an elegant saber. She made a face and set it back down, but Tyrande had gotten the point.

She was about to make a derisive comment about the uselessness of training with ethereal weapons, but by chance she’d already picked up another such training hilt. To her shock, when the manablade expanded it gained mass and presence; in an instant she was holding a perfectly weighted full-sized warglaive. A series of bows were racked nearby; a mere touch to the silver wood coaxed a glowing thread to expand, bending the bow until it was strung with raw arcane power.

“They’ll deactivate if you try to take them out of this room, of course,” said Valtrois with forced carelessness. “But I daresay it’s better than nothing.”

Tyrande would  _ not _ be grateful. She was not a whipped dog, to fawn at her masters’ feet in thanks for being thrown scraps from their table.

But the manabow hummed with life and purpose under her hand, and she hadn’t considered she would ever hold even this facsimile again. Even Windrunner seemed to have forgotten that she was a Sentinel as well.

“Yes,” she said, not grateful, never grateful, but perhaps willing not to hate. “I daresay it is.”

* * *

“...An’ just across the street we’ve set up Blight Control. Used to be Lordaeron Agricultural Commission, we figured out after the first few weeks tha’ it’s basically the same thing, now, an’ the building’s nice and central. Your stop’s right up there, Lady Proudmoore.”

The office she’d indicated was a badly weather-beaten building as grey and steeped in pain as the rest of this cursed city. It bore no markings, but the door was flanked by a human warrior in Gilnean colors and a heavily-armored Forsaken warrior. The latter was slightly distracted rubbing a shaggy black worg between the ears.

“Thank you, Lady Broadstone.” Anduin smiled at her. “I’m grateful for your service, as always.”

Rinda waved him off good-naturedly. “Jus’ Rinda, lad. My family are miners, no Ladies here. Happy to help. Keeps me closer to Ironforge, as well. Ye know how important that is to me.”

Anduin grinned. “How are the kids?”

“Growing up too fast. The eldest but one, she’ll be apprenticed soon.”

Jaina made only a passing attempt to keep up with the banter; she had no idea how Light-wielders all seemed so damn familiar with one another.

Of course, the Kirin Tor also all seemed to know each other and Anduin frequently expressed bewilderment as to how in the world Jaina was familiar with seemingly every single mage he’d ever mentioned to her in passing. Perhaps they were just...ah, nerds.

It wasn’t that she was  _ trying  _ to block them out. It was just...she had very little energy to spend on small talk right now. For all Anduin’s idealistic appeals, and all Rinda’s commentary on the changing layout and new landmarks—

Jaina could have walked the streets of Lordaeron in her sleep, once. She knew these roads, these walls. This had been a home to her, if not as much as Dalaran then very nearly. So much had changed.

Not nearly enough had changed.

Even in the two short months in which Lordaeron had been inhabited again, it had gained...well, “life” seemed an insensitive term for it. But there were people here again, even if half of them were rotting corpses arguing over the price of cast-iron pans. 

Friends, acquaintances and bitter enemies called to one another in the streets; vendors called out to customers and potential customers. A young boy chased a scrawny terrier around a corner where they were both nearly crushed by a fast-trotting courier on a sleek black horse, before a passing orc reached out and caught the child around the chest. But for the most part people in the streets simply passed one another, intent on going about their day and giving the Alliance retinue with their armor and warhorses a wide berth.

If she closed her eyes, and tried to block out the lingering acrid smell of Blight that she wasn’t even sure was  _ real… _

It could be worse, she reminded herself. The city charter legal team could have been set up in the palace.

Jaina—wasn’t certain she could have coped with that. 

“If any of them want to take after their aunt,” Anduin was saying to Rinda, unaware of Jaina’s breathing growing shorter and more painful with every moment they wasted standing on a sunny street in Lordaeron like it was a normal thing to do. “I trust you’ll write to me. We certainly need more Broadstones to become paladins. I would be honored to make arrangements with a training order.”

“Not to interrupt,” Jaina interrupted.

“Aye, you’re right.” Rinda reined her big white charger to a stop. “We put ye in the old Archive Records Administration building,” she explained. “Best place to find resources to work from. Talet, love, what happened?”

Jaina blinked; the wolflike creature she’d assumed was a Forsaken pet had looked up with hopefully pricked ears the moment Rinda had rounded the corner, then—stood on its hind legs, proving itself to in fact be a rather small-built female worgen in dark forester’s clothes. The Forsaken who’d been giving her ear scritches gave an unabashed shrug and grinned at Jaina’s confusion.

The worgen—Talet, Rinda had called her—crossed to them and wordlessly held out a scroll to Anduin. That done, she placed a massive paw on Rinda’s leg and reached up to playfully tug the paladin’s long auburn braid between her teeth. 

“Everything’s fine,” Anduin answered for her, rolling the short missive up again. “Just a request to bless a recently rebuilt chapel before I leave. It wasn’t urgent.”

“She’d have found us instead of waiting, if it was.” Rinda gave a smile tender enough that it sent a spike of pain through Jaina’s soul, running her hands through the worgen’s mane. “Glad to see ye here safe, wolf. My wife,” she added as an aside to Jaina. “Wasn’t meant to be up from Ironforge for another week yet. Helpin’ protect the Forsaken’s the only time she’s ever asked me to request a posting. I’d have done it for her regardless. Ye know that.” The last was barely a murmur, again so quiet Jaina wasn’t certain she’d been meant to notice.

Talet’s tail wagged softly against her legs.

Jaina managed something that she was absolutely certain was not a smile. There were, she thought as she swung off her mare, only so many shadows of her own decimated dreams she could face in a single day.

“Let’s just get this over with,” she muttered.

Anduin dismounted behind her, looking concerned; Rinda moved to follow, but her attention was grabbed by raised voices at the end of the street. Part of Jaina was grimly relieved that the conflict for once wasn’t Horde-Alliance; the angry blood knight’s ears poked prominently through his hood as if the elaborate barding on his horse wasn’t enough to identify him. A stocky troll leading a string of pack mules down the street urged her ugly grey mount into the courser’s personal space and snapped something in Orcish that Jaina didn’t catch.

“Commander,” Anduin said to the leader of his security forces; but Rinda gestured for them to stay.

“Should go an’ break that up,” she sighed, bowing toward Anduin and giving Jaina a polite nod. “Better me than you, lad.”

“The people should see the Lordaeron guard keeping order, not Stormwind,” he agreed. “Thank you for your guidance, Captain. I can take it from here.”

The Records Administration building was musty and still smelled faintly of dust and rot; but there was no scent of mildew, which was impressive for any building that had spent a few decades un-maintained in Lordaeron. Someone had gone to great pains to weatherproof and clean out this place before moving in.

“Now, again, most of the team rotates in and out,” Anduin reminded her, taking the steps two at a time to keep up with Jaina’s hard, terse strides. “Please don’t hesitate to recruit whatever consultants you like. That should be even easier now that you’re involved, you can just…” He made a vague gesture that she assumed was meant to represent a portal. 

Jaina paused at the top of the stairs, taking in the workspace and trying very hard to hate it. The center of the room was taken up by a round table with a ramshackle assortment of chairs clustered around it, piles of books and parchment occupying most of the surface. Wide scribe’s desks were shoved against the walls wherever a spare few inches of floor space could be found; the rest of the walls were covered in shelves, crooked cupboards and cubbyholes for scrolls, the wood so old and rotten it creaked just looking at it.

A snap of her fingers lit the safety lanterns scattered throughout the room; in stark contrast to the broken-down amalgamation of junk that made up the rest of the workroom, these were high-quality Dalaran magelights. They gave a steady, adjustable light that threw no heat and required no flame, which was always useful in a room packed to the gills with extremely flammable substances and only one exit.

“I thought you said there hadn’t been much progress on the charter,” Jaina said, frowning at the massive amount of paperwork cramming the space. For that matter, most of the tomes looked...old. If not ancient. She picked up a leather-bound folio that looked much newer, only to find the papers inside yellow and brittle with age. “This is—what? Anduin, this is a trade agreement with  _ Stromgarde.  _ How did you even find this?”

“I didn’t, obviously,” he said, sounding almost offended. “That was all—”

“Proudmoore!” exclaimed the Forsaken who had absolutely not been at Jaina’s shoulder two seconds ago. “About time you showed up! How much do you remember about Lordaeron immigration law?”

“Beverly,” Anduin finished apologetically.

“Who?” said Jaina. “I’m sorry, what? Where did you come from?”

“Beverly Hale, I was upstairs,  _ immigration law, _ Proudmoore, work with me here.” Skeletal hands gripped Jaina’s shoulders as she suppressed a powerful urge to start throwing frostbolts. “You have to have known  _ something  _ about citizenship by marriage at least, you were engaged to the crown prince, for Light’s sake! Twenty years and I can’t find  _ shit, _ so we’re gonna have to work off oral reconstruction.”

Jaina stared at her.

“What?”

“She’s a historian,” Anduin tried to explain.

“I am  _ not,” _ Beverly griped. She ran a hand through choppy black hair. Or rather, what remained of a hand. It was mostly bones now. “I am a  _ file _ clerk. Which, gods know the Horde needs one. You know how much steel and salt pork the Horde goes through in a year? You know how much thought Garrosh Hellscream ever put into keeping track of any of it? Take a wild guess! None of which gives a girl much time to reconstruct Lordaeronian finance law with a focus on property and citizenship rights with an additional focus on small claims lawsuits.”

_ “What?” _ Jaina asked again.

Beverly spun and slammed her hands on the table. _ “Arthas Menethil owes me twelve hundred gold!” _

Jaina stared at her. After a moment, she turned to stare at Anduin.

“No takebacks,” he said immediately. 

“It’s not complicated,” said an impatient Beverly.  _ “Someone _ decided that murdering his entire country was a great idea and  _ some  _ people had just put down a deposit on a new apartment that they never got to live in.”

“I hate you,” Jaina told her beloved nephew.

Beverly did not seem to register the sentiment. “So that’s nine hundred gold for the first month’s rent  _ plus  _ a three hundred gold security deposit and I’m telling you, Proudmoore, there  _ was _ a clause in Lordaeronian small-claims law that entitled renters to full compensation if the property they were renting became uninhabitable between signing the lease and receiving the keys and come hell or high water, I am going to  _ prove it.” _

“And this is what you’ve been doing,” demanded Jaina, who was trying very hard to figure out what the hell was going on. “For the past  _ twenty years?” _

“There’s a Lordaeron government again,” Beverly said with glee. “Which means I can finally sue it! And then dismantle it and install a government of the people free of the shackles of archaic total monarchy!”

“Not that I can say you’re wrong,” said Anduin. “But I  _ am  _ right here.”

“You’re next!” Beverly told him cheerfully. “Abdicate or die! The workers of Azeroth will unite and claim their due!”

“She was...ah. The first Sylvanas named to the charter team,” Anduin told Jaina in an undertone. “I realize she’s...but wait until you see the number of records she’s managed to uncover, things we thought were lost forever. Unquestionably, Beverly Hale is the only expert on Lordaeronian legal systems we  _ have  _ anymore. She even managed to dig up some of the founding documents, and there’s an entire chest full of recovered personal correspondence generations back, letters from everyone from kings to merchants making even the slightest reference to some policy or another…”

“And people say the Forsaken are obsessive and mentally unstable!” Beverly called from under the table for some reason. “I’ll show them. I’ll show them all!”

“Oh dear,” observed Anduin. “Anyway, we have that. And...don’t be angry, Jaina. But some of the records goblins in Orgrimmar were sentimental, and...and Garrosh wasn’t the type to think of destroying trade contracts when they were...no longer needed, so…”

“We have Horde-side copies of the trade policies from Theramore,” Jaina said, tone empty.

“To reference,” Anduin said quietly. “We still want this to be Lordaeronian law, as much as possible. A foundation, to build something better from, but...the foundation should be recognisable. This is their culture, Jaina. Their history. It’s important to them.”

“Ha!” Beverly, who had somehow climbed on top of a rickety bookshelf, waved a single scrap of parchment triumphantly in the air. “Guess what, Proudmoore! We’re instituting an  _ estate tax! Fuck the gentry!” _

Anduin clapped Jaina on the shoulder and fled before she could give him the polymorphing he so richly deserved.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Working title of this chapter: Rise Of The NPCs.


	9. Sparring

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I LIIIIIIIIIVE.
> 
> If anyone happens to follow either of my relevant blogs on tumblr you know why the delay--I've been sick this past week and just didn't have any mental energy for ANYTHING let alone WoW fic. But I'm back baby! I'm back to inflict trade law negotiations upon you all! TREMBLE. REPENT.

Thalyssra took a long, slow breath.

Three hours. She’d given Valtrois about three hours for Tyrande to work out some of her frustrations. 

After all, the only  _ real  _ problem between them was Thalyssra’s active participation in ten thousand years of resentful abandonment resulting in fundamental earth-shattering differences in worldview, a military and political alliance with a hostile invading army, the brutal conquering by force of Tyrande’s ancestral homeland, the murder of her husband, the decimation of her priestesshood, and her kidnapping and isolation from everyone she had ever known or loved in order to imprison her indefinitely in the mana-warped reflection of her birth city.

Three hours of moderate exercise was  _ clearly _ enough time to work through those minor details.

Thalyssra pinched the bridge of her nose and took a longer, deeper breath.

“Let’s be optimistic,” she said out loud to no one in particular. “Maybe she and Valtrois will have killed each other by now and I will finally know peace.”

She raised a hand, then paused.

Like any Nightborne training facility, there were runes in the wood that she could press, activating a glowing symbol on the inside to warn those using the salle that the door was about to open. It was an essential safety feature to avoid walking directly into a fireball or spatial anomaly.

Given Tyrande’s mood of late, however, giving the woman advance warning of where Thalyssra would be standing in the next three seconds  _ might  _ not be in Thalyssra’s best interests.

All right, she was being ridiculous. Shaking her head at her own hesitation, Thalyssra pressed the warning glyph, waited the span of a heartbeat, and then strode inside.

A blast of raw arcane power missed her nose by inches.

A strangled yelp of  _ “Thalyss—” _ was cut off sharply as Thalyssra reacted on pure reflex, twisting on the spot and flinging a stasis matrix into place at the speed of thought.

Ears canting with a cocky kind of amusement, Tyrande rolled to her feet and flicked the blade of her ethereal warglaive up to a frozen Valtrois’ throat.

With an exasperated sigh, Thalyssra moved to drop her stasis spell. She didn’t quite get the chance before Valtrois had managed to disassemble the arcane matrix from within, flicking her ears with great dignity as she brushed nonexistent dust from her robes.

“That,” she informed Tyrande, “Does not  _ count.” _

Tyrande smirked. “A Sentinel is  _ always _ aware of her surroundings. And the advantages they might give her.”

“I  _ did _ use the indicator glyph,” Thalyssra pointed out.

Valtrois spluttered. “That is  _ not _ —I didn’t  _ see _ it!” 

Tyrande arched an eyebrow in a clear indication that she’d just said the same thing.

Ignoring Valtrois’ indignation, Thalyssra tilted her head and decided not to point out that Tyrande had used a single moment of distraction on her escort’s part to manipulate her into nearly blasting Thalyssra’s head off. If it became a pattern, they were going to have to have a conversation. For the moment, however, that would be...unnecessarily hostile.

“Best four out of seven?” she guessed with a glance between them. Not that she doubted Valtrois’ skill in the slightest, but if she guessed wrong, Valtrois was at least  _ less  _ likely to stab her over it.

Thalyssra was rather tired of being stabbed, all things considered.

Tyrande gave a quiet snort. Valtrois sent Thalyssra a poisonous look, but didn’t actually  _ deny  _ that Tyrande held the lead in their little impromptu sparring match.

Thalyssra glanced at their guest. For a split second, brief enough that she wasn’t certain she hadn’t imagined it, Tyrande met her gaze with a matching wry look. By the time Thalyssra had registered the exchange, however, the High Priestess’ face had shut down to a cool, empty mask.

With none of the half-playful taunting she’d shown a moment before, Tyrande flicked the training warglaive into what was very nearly parade rest.

“First Arcanist.” Anger would have been considerably less unnerving. “You were looking for either Valtrois or myself.”

“I  _ also  _ have a title,” Valtrois reminded her, to absolutely no response.

Thalyssra managed to contain a heavy sigh, offering a neutral smile instead and holding up the covered basket she’d managed not to drop while Valtrois was trying to murder her.

“I thought you might be hungry,” she said. Then, before Tyrande could find some way to be offended, “Or Valtrois would, at least. Casting burns a lot of calories, or so she claims every day around lunchtime.”

Valtrois put a hand over her heart, giving a sweeping court bow on  _ just  _ the near side of mocking. “You  _ know  _ how I do so like to be appreciated, First Arcanist.”

“I know you prefer to be appreciated in the form of free food,” Thalyssra replied, not bothering to control the fond cant of her ears. Valtrois’ utter lack of shame was a blessing; she obligingly took the basket from Thalyssra’s hand and helped herself to a cherry turnover that was in no way intended to be the first course. “Try to leave  _ something  _ for the High Priestess, won’t you?”

With great, deliberate dignity, Valtrois turned to Thalyssra and handed her the basket back. She gave another graceful bow, made a very rude gesture, and moved to the balcony without looking back. It got a soft snort from Tyrande. 

“The blessing of Elune sustains me beyond the endurance of most,” she said, still carefully expressionless. Whatever Thalyssra’s face did in response to that, Tyrande relented. She deactivated the training glaive, setting it aside and accepting a warm slice of quiche without further protest. “But the gesture is appreciated.”

Thalyssra suspected a more proper translation from the original Darnassian would be that Tyrande was hungry. She let that go.

“Don’t tell Valtrois about the spinach puffs,” she told Tyrande instead, just below a stage whisper. “Not if you intend to have any.”

Tyrande’s lips twitched. Thalyssra would take that as a victory.

The impromptu lunch break was…

Awkward. It was  _ agonizing _ , in fact, and Thalyssra was not convinced it didn’t last another ten thousand years. Neither of them had the  _ slightest  _ idea what to say to one another, and both were refusing to bring up the elekk in the room. Tyrande, she suspected, was too proud to be the first to offer an olive branch; and Thalyssra understood her reasons enough not to want to press her prematurely. Tyrande had a right to her fury. Asking for a truce felt...disrespectful, at best.

In the end, they stood four feet apart for the better part of thirty minutes, avoiding eye contact and completely wordless except for Thalyssra occasionally speaking up to clarify the contents of some food item Tyrande was considering. Valtrois made infrequent appearances to comment cuttingly on their stimulating conversation and steal spinach puffs.

Finally, Tyrande broke the torturous silence.

“You were not wrong,” she said, stiff but not harsh. “About her loyalty, though she pretends otherwise. She would die in an instant if you asked it.”

“I know.” Thalyssra cleared her throat, clearing the sudden knot. “And the price I pay is the inability to justify having her quietly assassinated.”

“I heard that,” said Valtrois, who had just made off with the last of the onion quiche.

Tyrande rolled her eyes as she picked up a glazed pomegranate instead—then paused, a thoughtful expression on her face.

“Forgive her,” she said, soft and warm and jolting Thalyssra like a slap across the face at the abrupt change in tone. “We had been discussing our appreciation for your service. Here, my friend. Catch.”

Valtrois, also clearly unnerved by Tyrande’s sudden friendliness, nearly fumbled the fruit but managed at the last moment to keep her hold.

“Ah...” she said, glancing at Thalyssra for guidance and receiving instead a bewildered shrug. “Thank you, High Priestess.”

Tyrande smiled, a nightsaber grin hidden behind the mild expression. “Not at all,” she said casually, leaning over to snag a manabow from the training rack. It strung itself in her hands and manifested a glowing arrow. “Now put it on your head—”

With a high-pitched yelp, Valtrois teleported out of the salle.

A silver arrow pinned the pomegranate neatly through the center before it hit the floor.

* * *

“Hmm. I dunno, Proudmoore.” Beverly turned seriously to her associate. “What do you think, Malcolm?”

Malcolm thoughtfully licked his testicles for several seconds before shaking his head wildly.

“Well said.” Beverly turned back to Jaina. “Guild associations aren’t good enough. That’s not the same as trade unions and you know it.”

“Right,” said Jaina. “Again, Malcolm does not actually get a  _ vote, _ because Malcolm is a rat.”

“Well, if you think about it logically,” said Beverly. “Lordaeron could be run by filthy, aggressive vermin that contribute nothing to society but disease and famine, swarming over the country like a plague, a pervasive presence in every home, stealing the fruits of our labor, gorging themselves on food they did nothing to earn, spoiling everyday necessities and ruining lives and futures without a second thought—”

“Or it could be run by a rat,  _ yes, _ I get it.” Jaina rubbed her temples, breathing deeply. 

She hadn’t met  _ Malcolm  _ for the first few days. That was probably for the best. For better or worse, Jaina thought grimly, she was committed  _ now. _ Even if her administrative partner insisted on referring to the rodent who lived in the walls as a coworker.

“All I meant was that the guild system already exists. It would likely be far more effective to integrate union protection into existing guild law, rather than try to separate them entirely. It would add greater legitimacy as well as tapping into the preexisting Guild tendency toward self-policing.”

Beverly’s glowing yellow eyes narrowed suspiciously. She reached over and picked up Malcolm, putting him on her head.

“Explain.”

Jaina sat forward. “As it stands, trade guilds were already intended to provide mutual support and protection within a field. They  _ already  _ have systems in place for monitoring and regulating best practices in their members, and since the guild system is established and trusted, we’ll face less pushback and require  _ far  _ less money and time launching the new regulations. We should utilize the resources we already have.”

“Wow,” said Beverly. “You really believe that shit.”

“I—beg your pardon?”

The Forsaken looked vaguely pitying, which was a bit hard to swallow from a woman with a  _ rat  _ in her hair. “Guilds exist to protect themselves. Their priority is protecting artificially inflated profits within their trade. If you’re being real generous, it’s quality assurance for consumers, but believe me, if they could keep their monopoly in place without having to guarantee quality product, they would fuck us dry and charge us for it!”

“I…” Jaina stopped, considering her words carefully. “I— _ hate you, _ all right, listen to me. That is not the point.”

_ “Guilds exist solely as a self-serving class barrier to control competition and force out impoverished innovators! _ You have to  _ pay  _ to be a member of a guild—”

“Unions have dues,” Jaina pointed out.

“—and you’re not—don’t get smart, Proudmoore, unions don’t come around and bust your kneecaps if you can’t afford to join. Forsaken have a kneecap shortage already!”

“How,” Jaina asked, “does one quantify a shortage of—”

“And once they  _ get  _ you a guild has total control over its members, they’re  _ supposed  _ to regulate unethical practice but that’s never been enforced, and they have no obligation to operate with any goal other than keeping the _ guild _ on top, not protecting its members from exploitation! You can’t walk down a street unaffiliated without some guild rep trying to jump your ass! I had to  _ stab  _ one yesterday!”

Alcohol. Jaina wanted alcohol. “Don’t stab the guild recruiters, Beverly.”

“Hey, noticed you coming in from the market, you do some trade on the side? Good little business there. Shame if something were to  _ happen  _ to it. You should join my fucking  _ guild!” _

“Beverly...”

Beverly was far beyond hearing, arms gesturing violently around her head with no apparent regard for their structural integrity. “No, I don’t know your name or your business practices or anything about you, I just know I’m an arrogant thug who gets paid by the number of idiots I strongarm into our fucking  _ protection racket _ —”

“That’s why I’m  _ saying  _ we should put restrictions on the power of guilds!” Jaina exclaimed to sympathetic consideration from Malcolm. She was beginning to change her mind about that one; he was clearly the only sane person in this room. “We institute a system that inherently incentivizes a guild maintaining a good reputation if it wants to keep its status without incurring penalties, and incorporate union protections into Lordaeron guild charters from the beginning. It wouldn’t just protect Lordaeron citizens; a guild having to alter its fundamental charter to be allowed to operate in the city would open those protections to  _ everyone,  _ even outside the kingdom.”

“So here just sign this line and you’ll be considered a member automatically, no, you don’t get to read any of our policies or interact with leadership at all before making your decision, this is binding now, welcome to  _ the fucking guild, _ you’ll be paying your fees on the first of the month from now until you die  _ again _ and in the meantime wait, say what now?”

Beverly spun around fast enough that there was a very real risk of snapping her own neck, her brain just having apparently caught up to her ears. Jaina folded her arms and rested her head on the table, trying not to scream.

She was going to commit high treason. She was going to murder High King Anduin Llane Wrynn with her own two bare hands and it was going to be worth it.

_ “You _ two look like you’re having fun.”

“Oh, thank the light,” Jaina breathed, raising her head. “Lillian Voss, I presume.”

“Mmm.” The Forsaken woman who’d just let herself in through the window dropped to the floor and scritched Malcolm behind the ears. “Hey, Bev. How’s the revolution?”

“Don’t  _ encourage  _ her!” 

“We’re getting there,” reported Beverly with a jaunty grin that showed considerably more of the tooth than was generally acceptable. “Next week we’re stripping the ruling class of their hereditary privileges and reclaiming control of the means of production.”

“We’re—working on it,” Jaina said hastily. “I’m with you, I’m just iffy on the bits with the...well it’s really just that all of these people are already dead, so it seems a bit like—a bit excessive.”

Lillian looked at her blankly for several seconds.

“Nice save,” she said drily. “Very subtle. Very tactful. Good job not saying ‘overkill’, Lady Proudmoore. That was very culturally sensitive of you.”

Jaina hoped neither of them could see her blush, but she was far from optimistic. “I’m  _ trying, _ all right?”

“She’s overthinking it,” said Beverly.

Jaina forced down a spike of annoyance that wasn’t really fair. “Yes, I am,” she snapped. All right, maybe she hadn’t forced it down as well as she thought. “That’s why I asked you here, Miss…”

“Don’t you dare,” their guest warned her. “It’s Lillian to you.”

Thoughts flashing to her own father before skittering away in pain like beetles before the light, Jaina winced. “I...understand that better than you may assume. Forgive me. We’ll come back to union law later, if you’re here.”

“Maybe I’m interested in union law,” Lillian countered.

“You’re not. She’s not,” Jaina said quickly, as Beverly had just lit up like a firework. “You’re not. We are talking about hate speech.”

Lillian didn’t react. “Fun.”

Jaina...took a deep breath.

“We wanted your advice specifically about definitions,” she said, ignoring the awkwardness of Lillian Voss’ undivided attention and the amused looks Beverly kept exchanging with Malcolm. “You...have more experience, with the Crusade. We want to create a set of guidelines to define what sets someone wearing a badge with the symbol of the Scarlet Crusade apart from someone wearing the symbol of...say, Darnassus. And then we need to determine penalties for violating those guidelines.  _ Reasonable _ penalties,” she added hastily. “But...effective.”

Lillian’s eyes widened slightly with understanding, and she sat forward.

“A Darnassus seal might make certain people angry or uncomfortable,” Jaina allowed. “It may imply advocating for social unrest, it  _ certainly  _ indicates certain political opinions, but that’s not the same thing.”

Lillian steepled her fingers, holding Jaina’s gaze for some time.

“I might be willing to help you,” she said. “But first, you’ll answer one question.”

Jaina waited, wary but listening.

Lillian reached into her pocket and pulled out three scraps of fabric; identifying patches, cut from uniforms or bags.

She lay them out on the table, calmly and mercilessly, one by one. Jaina stiffened as she recognized the first; Beverly frowned and leaned forward.

“Hey now,” she said. “Listen, she  _ is _ trying, you don’t have to—”

Lillian held up a hand. By some miracle, Beverly actually shut up.

A Kor’kron Elite captain’s badge. The sigil of the Sunreavers. And then, deep sea-green and gold—

“Where did you  _ get  _ this?” Jaina whispered. Lillian shook her head.

“You just tell me, before I decide if you’re worth my time,” she said. “Tell me which of those your guidelines will ban from the city.”

There was a long silence. Anger crackled under Jaina’s skin—the audacity, the  _ ambush, _ it wasn’t fair to do this to her—like she didn’t understand, like she wasn’t— 

But then it was completely fair.

“You know perfectly well which one I’d ban,” she snapped, and flung the Proudmoore marine’s patch into Lillian Voss’ impassive face. “There’s no  _ possible  _ reason for anyone to display that symbol in the city except as a disgusting anti-orc sentiment. Now get that Sunreaver sigil off my  _ fucking  _ desk!”

Lillian nodded and collected her patches. Before Jaina could say anything else, a rotting hand reached out and gripped her wrist.

“Lady Proudmoore,” she said, firm but not harsh. “I served the Scarlet Crusade my whole life. I killed and burned for them. I was their secret weapon and I believed in everything I did. I died thinking I’d been in the right. I’m not better than you. I was  _ asking.” _

After another long pause, Jaina inclined her head. This time her shoulders softened into the gesture, and Lillian gave a genuine smile.

“Let’s get started then,” she said. “Remind me what you wanted to ask—all right, where the  _ hell  _ is Beverly?”

* * *

Tyrande paused.

There was still time  _ not  _ to reveal herself. It wasn’t as if she and Thalyssra made any effort at coordinating their schedules—not since their argument a week ago, anyway. Even before that, the greatest concession to a shared schedule had been that they  _ generally  _ ate at the same time. And it was far from a hard and fast rule, mostly a reality of convenience. 

But It was too early to sleep, even if Thalyssra would probably be relieved if Tyrande went to bed first for once; enough muttered comments under her breath had confirmed that the First Arcanist was not  _ entirely  _ thrilled at having Tyrande up and about while she was unconscious.

Tyrande allowed herself a small smirk at that.

The point was, there was no real reason why she  _ should  _ join Thalyssra on the balcony. It was far from expected, and she didn’t particularly care about the injured feelings of her so-called wife.

But she was bored.

Bored, and frustrated with the world and with her own helplessness, and she was quickly growing to  _ hate  _ the crushing isolation of stone walls. The mana in the Nighthold’s very masonry was an oppressive, tangible force, buzzing in her ears and prickling under her skin like a constant swarm of gnats. She wanted fresh air, and to stand under the stars like a living creature.

Perhaps she couldn’t face the thought of doing that alone, right now.

Besides. Realistically speaking, Thalyssra had to know she was here already. The entire Nighthold was warded within an inch of dissolving into arcane powder under the weight of its own enchantment. Turning away now would be a sign of weakness. Did the High Priestess of Elune turn tail and run so easily?

Her suspicions were confirmed when she stepped out of the shadows and into the fading light of sunset. Thalyssra, leaning casually against a marble pillar and looking down over the harbor, didn’t so much as twitch.

“The weather’s changing,” Thalyssra said quietly. “It’s been ten thousand years since I felt the breeze off those mountains.”

Proof of time passing. Entirely too much time spent  _ here. _ But Tyrande was...tired was the wrong word. But she didn’t want to have that fight, not right now.

“Is Suramar prepared for the realities of winter?” she asked instead. 

Tyrande Whisperwind felt no particular need to indulge in small talk and diplomatic softness, not with this woman. But Thalyssra at least had the sense not to bristle like an indignant kitten over the implication.

“Yes, and no,” she answered willingly. Her attention was still focused on something on the ground. “The Nightborne realize that ten millennia of perfect climate control has left us woefully unprepared for a harsh winter. On an individual level...many of my people have yet to understand what that will truly mean. This will be our first true winter in...peacetime defined as not actively warding off a Legion invasion.”

For the first time she glanced up, looking wary. Tyrande narrowed her eyes, not remotely convinced Thalyssra had remembered that the world was very much  _ not  _ in a state of peace sooner than the last five seconds; but, for now, she would allow it.

Visibly relieved, Thalyssra returned to her observation of whatever was so interesting down in the harbor.

“We have the Highmountain to advise us,” she said. “And I’ve made certain to allocate funds and resources to ensure that our most vulnerable citizens will be protected from the elements. Thank you, for your concern. You’re welcome to look over our current plans; I would value your input as well.”

Tyrande, despite herself, couldn’t find anything to object to in the offer. For all she held against the Nightborne as a faction, she had never been so cold as to wish harm on the common citizens of Suramar. Even, or perhaps especially, through inaction.

She nodded, and managed to do it with good grace.

Thalyssra opened her mouth as if to reply, still not looking up. Before she had a chance to stuff her foot into it yet again, Tyrande spoke.

“What are you  _ looking _ at?”

Thalyssra’s lips twitched. “Oh,” she said, shifting to the side to let Tyrande move closer and giving a vague wave of the hand. “Your two young resident spies of several dozen. They’re currently violating restricted shipping lanes.”

Tyrande arched an eyebrow, stepping carefully into Thalyssra’s space without touching her, and followed the First Arcanist’s line of sight.

Almost immediately, her headache was back.

“Ah.”

Thalyssra actually laughed, albeit quietly, at that. “At the moment, they’re doing no harm. I’m mostly curious. And I intend to step in if the Duskwatch bothers them too directly. Never a dull moment.”

From this distance, of course, there was no way to  _ know  _ that this was the same pair of young lovers she’d run into so briefly a week before. But she could see enough; the overall impression of pale blue was enough to identify a Draenei sitting on the edge of one of the Nighthold bridge support columns, hooves dangling off the wavebreak in the middle of the harbor. The water rose and danced, though not in the normal manner of a summoned elemental; abstract patterns, clearly following some form of direction.

Music, Valtrois had said.

The sleek, steel-grey dolphin making playful, dramatic leaps in and out of the patterns, sometimes in perfect harmony and sometimes maliciously ruining them to great effect, solidified the identification. There would be few enough Kaldorei in the city at all, let alone druids, let alone druids with a perfected dolphin transformation.

Tyrande’s ear flicked. “You seem very certain of their status as sleeper agents,” she said. The irritation was...not feigned, but there was very little heat in it. 

“Mmm. You needn’t take my word for it.” Thalyssra looked up, and held out a hand swirling with violet energy. “I know you were interrupted, last time.”

Tyrande hesitated. The phrasing of the offer...concerned her. With observation wards pockmarking every square centimeter of the city, Thalyssra’s convenient offer to let her speak ‘alone’ with a pair of vulnerable young women she openly acknowledged as spies could not more obviously be a trap. But why bother, what game could she possibly intend to play, if—

She barely had time to register the roll of Thalyssra’s eyes before warm fingers splayed between her shoulder blades. The world warped gently, and before Tyrande had time to blink she was standing under a bridge, laughter and the sound of waves in her ears. 


	10. Beneath Notice

“...absolutely  _ ridiculous, _ you know that?”

“I do not know that. Nobody in my entire life has ever told me that before.”

There was an undignified snort as Tyrande paused in the shadow of the bridge column, watching and listening.

Waves broke around the cream-colored stone, throwing white spray and the scent of salt into the air. The Draenei sitting near the edge seemed unconcerned with the effect of saltwater on her harp strings; Tyrande couldn’t sense any magic in the instrument over the cloying arcane mist that covered all of Suramar, but a closer look confirmed a faint glow of mana over the metal.

The girl wore the soft, floor-length robes of a mage, hiked up in a ladylike fashion around backward-facing knees so that her hooves could trail in the cold water. For the moment, the fingers splayed across her weatherbeaten lap harp were still as she called back and forth with a dolphin lazing on the surface of the water nearby.

“Oh really?” A deliberate discordant pluck of a string sent a jet of water into the dolphin’s eye. “What  _ did _ they call you?”

“Nothing I’m gonna repeat!” The dolphin surged forward, shifting midway into a young elf who had badly misjudged her momentum and flailed for the edge of the wavebreak, missing it dramatically and vanishing underwater. A dripping wet Levaden Mountaincall popped up a few seconds later, hauling herself up to rest her head on crossed arms on the edge. She seemed unconcerned by her dunking, grinning up at the young mage. 

“You have a filter now? That’s new!”

“I can’t use that kind of language in front of a lady,” Levaden retorted. “It’d give you ideas and you’re mean enough already. Holy  _ shit, _ it’s freezing, I did  _ not  _ think this through, be right back.”

Dusky ears plunged back under the waves; a wide-fluked tail rose up above them and pumped once, and the dolphin with all its cold-water blubber darted back out from under the bridge and toward the parts of the harbor still bathed in sunlight.

The Draenei laughed, and plucked out a light riff on the Stormwind horse-racing call to the start. 

It sent a pang through Tyrande’s heart. After everything, with all the darkness and pain still clawing her to pieces from deep in her soul—two young lovers were playing in the water, teasing and bantering in the shadow of the Nighthold itself. A Kaldorei druid, alive and free and careless; was that not what she had wanted? What the sacrifice was for? 

Tyrande stepped forward and knelt at the girl’s side.

“I gather,” she said quietly, earning a violent jump, “that a failure to entirely think things through is not uncommon in that one.”

_ “Pheta _ vi hylas,” the Draenei rasped, hand over her heart as she took a deep breath.  _ “Good fortune, _ High Priestess, and  _ please _ don’t ever do that again.”

“My apologies, young one.”

“Velshada Wolfsong, Lady Whisperwind.” The young Draenei gave a polite seated bow as she tapped her instrument, magically expelling any saltwater from the aged wood as she slid it into a carrying case. It was hardly courtly, but it would pass muster for a Sentinel greeting her commanding officer and there was enough grace in her lowered eyes and inclined head that it was clear her respect was genuine. “You honor us. I think you just took a few centuries off my lifespan, but you honor us. Can we help you in any way?”

Tyrande smiled. “I intended only to speak to the both of you. I worry for the safety of all my people—and their loved ones.”

The young woman flushed, fingers dancing shyly over her horns. “I...thank you, my lady. We’re fine. We haven’t had any more problems with the Deathguard, anyway. Or the Duskwatch, which was always a bigger concern. Thalyssra’s done a lot to get them in check, but old habits die hard, and they had way too much power for  _ way  _ too long.”

Tyrande relaxed her ears. She also noted with some amusement that this nameless mage, whose skill and power did not seem to indicate she was even an adventurer, seemed perfectly comfortable on first-name terms with the First Arcanist of Suramar. Valtrois was a  _ terrible  _ influence.

Not nameless, she corrected herself. The girl had introduced herself, after all.

“Forgive me,” she mused. “But I was not aware the Draenei made use of surnames.”

“The Kaldorei do,” Velshada said simply. “It was...a gift.”

Tyrande’s eyebrows rose quite without her permission. She glanced out over the water, where a dark dorsal fin briefly peeked out between the waves before vanishing again. “She cares for you a great deal, then.”

“She’s special.” Velshada smiled. “And smarter than people give her credit for. Levaden just...she once told me she became a druid to help people, not trees. She picks stupid fights, High Priestess, but she very rarely picks the wrong ones.”

“She certainly has courage,” allowed Tyrande, fondness in her voice. “A protector, then. Though some judgement in  _ who  _ she chooses to protect might serve. In the thirty seconds I knew her she tried to defend the honor of the Draenei, the Kaldorei, the Alliance as a whole, and even the Forsaken.”

The girl stiffened, which surprised Tyrande. It certainly hadn’t been  _ intended  _ as a rebuke.

_ “Even _ the Forsaken?”

Tyrande raised her eyebrows again, this time accenting the gesture with a firm twitch of her ears. Not a hard pin; Velshada was not hers to censure, and had said nothing to offend as of yet. But a warning.

Far from heeding it, Velshada sat up straighter, raising an eyebrow of her own. She opened her mouth to speak—and was interrupted by a sudden explosion of water and laughter as Levaden rejoined them, surging upward in a twisting rush and slamming back into the bay with all her might.

_ “ _ I’m going to  _ kill  _ you, you lunatic, it’s  _ freezing  _ out here!”

Hysterical laughter bubbled up over the waves as the dolphin rolled over onto its back, then righted itself again. “You should have been paying attention! What’s your friend  _ oh goddess—” _

Whatever else she might have said, which Tyrande suspected would have been heretical enough that the High Priestess of Elune might have been obligated to do something about it, was silenced by mass quantities of seawater.

* * *

Jaina took a long, deep breath.

This proved to be a mistake given the ever-present layer of dust in the room, and she spent the next several minutes sneezing violently and irritating Malcolm.

“Wheek,” he told her sternly. She turned to glare at him.

“Well, don’t blame me,” she snapped. “File a complaint with your mistress if you’re upset.  _ I’m _ not the one who won’t let us open a window and air the place out.”

No, Jaina wasn’t the one obsessively worried about sun exposure on the historical documents. She was just the grown human archmage and former leader of nations sitting at a low table  _ arguing with a rat. _

“Do we have a complaint-filing system, Miss Jaina?” came a polite comment from her elbow.

Jaina sighed, turning carefully so as not to elbow the dark-haired gnome in the face.

“We probably should,” she allowed. “Thank you, Teelic, what are these?”

“These are from Miss Beverly, ma’am.” The stack was nearly as big as he was; only big, deep blue eyes peeked out over the teetering pile of notepads. “She’s currently annotating the fourth draft of last week’s tax-code proposal to return to you for  _ your  _ notes before amending it again, but she requested a list of all relevant sources regarding criminal justice in Old Lordaeron last week. I appreciate your patience as I collected them.”

“I don’t know whether you’re a godsend or a curse,” Jaina informed the young man as she carefully lifted the stack from his arms. “But I appreciate you all the same. Where _ is _ Beverly, anyway?”

Without missing a beat or any variation in tone, Teelic responded, “Miss Beverly is in the chandelier, ma’am.”

Jaina looked up. Beverly, who was in fact curled up inside the dusty old chandelier hanging from the rafters with a massive tome against her knees, waved cheerfully. Malcolm squeaked a greeting from Jaina’s shoulder.

“...Thank you, Teelic.”

“I’m always happy to help, Miss Jaina.”

She shook her head and began sorting through the list of criminal justice sources.

Teelic Silverspark was, frankly, a rock of normality amid all this...Beverly. After Jaina and her beloved counterpart had gotten in their third shouting match of the week over clashing organizational systems, the city guard had finally gotten involved.

By either good or bad luck, the paladin on the nearest patrol route had been Rinda Broadstone again. Equally unimpressed with both of them, she’d actually drawn a line in chalk down the center of the room like Jaina’s mother had once done when she was unable to play nicely with Tandred at the age of six. 

Rinda had then confiscated the cleaver that Beverly was using to defend her side of the line. No one was actually certain where Beverly had gotten a cleaver.

A week later the guard-captain had unceremoniously barged in and deposited Teelic on the top of the stairs with  _ extremely  _ stern instructions to treat the lad well or face the wrath of the Light. Jaina was actually quite touched by the gesture; he was apparently Rinda’s personal clerk from Ironforge, and his voluntary presence was a vote of confidence from both Teelic and Rinda herself.

Jaina was familiar with his breed—they sprang up between the cobblestones like dandelions in Dalaran, where high-ranking mages slowly became allergic to doing their own administration unless they were named Jaina Proudmoore and exuded a constant aura of having been recently shoved in a locker no matter how powerful or influential they became. And even  _ she  _ couldn’t function without a few just like him. Inkstained sleeves and quick hands and good handwriting, usually orphans, always underweight, used to being cuffed around the head and pinched by the ear by their superiors; whip-smart and honest and chronically undervalued and the only reason any archmage ever born got their bills handled, rent paid, laundry done, stationary ordered, or kitchens stocked.

Essential, for a mid-rank paladin who might be reassigned or deployed at a moment’s notice and would like to have an apartment and a stall for her ram available when she returned. It was no wonder she was the rare employer who treated him with the respect, good pay and free room and board he deserved; diamonds were  _ worthless  _ compared to a skilled and honest clerk _ . _ Especially if, like Rinda, you had seven adopted children in various apprenticeships and boarding schools who needed a representative in your absence.

_ Eight _ adopted children, Jaina corrected herself, watching Teelic cheerfully bustle around straightening stacks of books. He didn’t see it himself, she didn’t think. But Rinda Broadstone had eight children.

And one of them had a supernatural gift for consolidating disparate organizational systems. Or as he put it, designing literally any organizational system at all, Miss Jaina, meaning no offense, ma’am.

She thought that was a little unfair. Her organizational system made perfect sense, or it had before Beverly got into it and started rooting around like some kind of demented weasel. Jaina had known where  _ everything  _ was! Still, she could reluctantly allow that bringing in a neutral, inoffensive third part to organize things was better than a battle of wills between two people who were...yes, all right, she could admit it. Between two people who were equally intelligent, driven, and creative, with similar values but wildly different work styles.

There. She’d said it.  _ Are you happy now, Anduin? Ass. _

A deferential cough broke her concentration.

“Pardon me, Miss Jaina.” He’d produced yet another notepad and a metal quill from somewhere. “It’s my break, and I’m going to find a pub for supper. Would you like me to pick anything up for you, ma’am? Mage-buns are not supper, Miss Jaina.”

Jaina, who had  _ absolutely  _ not just opened her mouth to make that very excuse, closed it with a snap and ignored his pleased look.

“And working for eight hours straight is very unhealthy for your body and mind,” he added helpfully.

From the chandelier, Beverly commented, “Also, productivity is adversely affected by stressful and depersonalizing working conditions.”

After glaring for a few seconds just for the principle of the thing, Jaina gave in. Standing, she cracked her back. “Yes, all right. I think I’ll come with you, then, if you don’t mind. I need air.”

“Bitch,” said Beverly in a friendly manner. “Rub it in why don’t you.”

“I hate you. And I have commitments in Stormwind coming up, so I won’t be here for several days to go over this—Beverly, I’m not planning to come back after I eat, when are you free next week?”

Beverly didn’t look up from her notes. “None of us are free so long as the gears of Azeroth’s economy are oiled with the common blood of her citizens,” she said amiably. “But I don’t have plans next Tuesday or on Wednesday through Saturday after lunch.”

Jaina turned to Malcolm, still perched on her shoulder.

“I’m going to do it. I’m going to kill her again,” she informed him. Malcolm sniffed her nose and squeaked.

* * *

After several minutes of heaving and desperate, wracking coughs, Velshada patted her lover between the shoulderblades.

Tenderly, lovingly, she informed Levaden, “You deserved that.”

“Not—my fault,” the druid gasped. “Fight or flight reflex. Triggered the stag. Doesn’t—swim great. That one was—all you, High Priestess.” 

“So I see.” Tyrande squeezed some of the water out of her sleeves. Velshada had been correct; with the sun going down, the temperature was swiftly dropping from brisk to  _ cold, _ and a dousing with cold water hadn’t helped.

But the moonlight was warm under her skin, Elune’s light soothing the chill like laughter on a snowy day. As subtly as she could, Tyrande placed her fingertips on Levaden’s shoulder. The warmth of the Goddess flowed into her, easing her shivers and the lingering cough. Faster than she had anticipated—faster than would be expected in anyone but longtime mates—the blessing spread like a blooming flower from the young druid and into Velshada.

Levaden gave one more hard cough to clear the seawater from her lungs, then looked up with an expression that was endearingly eager and not nearly sheepish enough.

“Uh,” she said. “H-hi. Um. Not...sure this counts as better circumstances, High Priestess. But whatever I can do for you, I swear, say the word. Anything. I’ll find a way.”

“Do you know,” Tyrande answered, “I almost believe you would.”

“She almost died once climbing up the side of Teldrassil in cat form because no one agreed with her when she said only having one way in and out was stupid.” Velshada’s expression was warm. “She  _ absolutely  _ would. And it would work, too.”

“We really need to do something about that,” Levaden muttered. “At least one other route, even if it’s only for emergencies. The whole tree is just one giant fire hazard.”

Tyrande tried and failed to control her expression. Out of the mouths of irreverent, half-grown feral troublemakers...how much faster might they have evacuated, how much harder would the Horde have had to fight, if…?

And now, with Azerite explosives planted throughout the tree, with the druids weakened and the only way out through Darnassus...oh, Levaden Mountaincall was not the only one who had nightmares about what a single wildfire could do to Teldrassil.

She didn’t miss the glance exchanged by the pair; but she also didn’t protest when Velshada spoke up again.

“We were just talking about the Forsaken,” she said.

That was, somehow, better. Velshada once more did not respond to the harder warning cant of Tyrande’s ears. She settled back against the column, perfectly at ease but not insolent, as Levaden’s eyes widened. 

Suddenly nervous, she asked, “So, um...what were you...saying? About the Forsaken? Exactly? To Tyrande Whisperwind?  _ Vel?” _

“I was only saying that they deserve your protection,” she answered, quiet over the sound of the waves. 

“Vel’s protective of the Forsaken,” Levaden clarified, seeming anxious to be helpful in some way. Or at least to deflect attention onto herself—a protector indeed then "And the Shal’dorei. A lot of the Alliance think the Nightborne are cowards, and—I know I said some stuff a few weeks ago, but not everyone’s a fighter and not everyone should have to be.”

“The Legion specializes in making people feel helpless,” Velshada murmured. 

Tyrande was not terribly impressed; she knew perfectly well and firsthand what the Legion specialized in, but she was hardly going to debate a pair of children over the political realities of the War of the Ancients. Judging by the defiant toss of Levaden’s head—the flashing eyes of a young girl who seemed to think she still had antlers—her sudden coolness did not go unnoticed.

“Trauma doesn’t make you weak,” Levaden said stubbornly. 

Her lover didn’t seem to have noticed the exchange, and Tyrande felt a prick of shame for forgetting what it  _ meant  _ to be a Draenei that young as Velshada spoke again. “My people understand how the Legion works, how it can...break you. After the Exodar crashed, I ran away.” Her voice was calm and steady, but the way Levaden moved to her side suggested she hadn’t always been able to say those words quite so frankly. “Everyone wanted me to be an adventurer, train as a mage in Stormwind, but I couldn’t...face it anymore. If I could have retreated into a bubble for ten thousand years of peace I would have been first in line.” 

“You were sixteen, Vel,” Levaden told her. “And it wouldn’t have been anything to be ashamed of if you were six thousand.”

She made a face. “As it happened, I ran straight into the Horde front at Astranaar and nearly got killed anyway. I would have, if my master hadn’t picked me up. I was in...really bad shape.”

Tyrande’s eyebrows lifted. “You were at Astranaar? That was a hard fight for a child already sickened by war.”

“Tell her the frost nova thing,” Levaden urged.

“You’re a menace,” Velshada informed her. Looking back up at Tyrande, she relented. “It’s...nothing. I’d linked up with my master by accident—she was a fur trapper who needed someone to identify some magical crystals in the field, and I was there, and, I mean...I’m a Draenei, magical crystals are kind of our  _ thing. _ The Horde started firebombing Astranaar and...I told you I was in bad shape.” She hugged herself. “My magic was...gone. You have to have clarity of purpose to cast, you can’t...emotional instability and magic don’t mix.”

That was not, technically, true; but Tyrande was well aware that they  _ should  _ not mix. Illidan alone was proof of  _ that. _ And if a sixteen-year-old girl’s trauma centered entirely around being used as a premature weapon of war she could well imagine that, when she began to lose control of her emotions, her magic would  _ fail  _ rather than flare.

It was not an uncommon reaction to such trauma. She had known priestesses with similar symptoms, as well as soldiers; a few, always, in every war. The mind protected itself. Denied respite, it might very well take matters into its own hands. If it was unable to process its suffering, sometimes it would simply paralyze a Sentinel’s bow arm, block off a priestess’ aura to make even channeling the healing power of the Goddess impossible. Physically unable to perform the actions that had wounded it in the first place, the body could no longer act to further traumatize the mind. The symptoms were neither feigned nor imagined; the patients often actively wished to  _ continue  _ fighting. But Elune knew her children’s limits. Neither magic nor divine intervention could heal such injury; only time. Time and care.

It seemed the Light was capable of similar compassion. If it could be called compassion, when it caused such recrimination in a girl who should never have been called upon to act as a fully-fledged mage in the first place. Tyrande...could not blame the Draenei. Shandris had been just as young, when she was first trained. The Legion did terrible things to a people; it forced them to ask such terrible things of their  _ children _ ...

“So Talet told me to help fight the fires and I...couldn’t. I couldn’t even call a frostbolt, and I’d been trained my whole life for this. I kind of...had a breakdown, I thought she would send me away, but she just.” Velshada coughed. “It sounds obvious, but she just...gave me a bucket of water. I hold the maps and manage her supplies, and do the talking, and keep track of her assignments, and that’s all. I ended up wanting to study magic again to help her in the field, but she never  _ asked  _ me to.”

“That’s why we care so much about the Forsaken,” Levaden interjected. “It’s not a faction thing, ma’am. It’s just, you know, people, and the Forsaken especially are kind of personal, because...reasons...”

Velshada rescued her. “My master. My mentor,” she clarified. “I’m just...a mage, and a Draenei. We have words for the person who taught you everything you know. Talet’s nothing special, not even an adventurer, she’s just a scout, but—she’s my whole world. And she loves the Forsaken like brothers.”

Tyrande tilted her head slightly, softening the set of her ears only because the stiffness was clearly making young Levaden nervous. If nothing else, she couldn’t bear the thought of one of the only Kaldorei in the city being  _ afraid _ of her. “You were mentored by a Forsaken mage, then. I begin to understand why you’ve yet to leave Suramar.”

It came out harsher than she intended. In truth, she had nothing but compassion for a young woman in that position; being ‘stranded’ in Horde territory must be a blessing. Velshada, however, gave a surprised laugh.

“What? No—no, forgive me, High Priestess. Talet’s worgen. She was Darnassus auxiliary until she married into Ironforge. But the Forsaken are really important to her.”

Now that was...odd, if intellectually fascinating. Somehow she doubted Genn approved. “Forgive me if this woman’s loyalties strike me as unusual at best.”

Velshada nearly snarled. Perhaps she’d learned  _ that _ from her mentor as well.

“Oh no,” said Levaden.

Velshada had the grace to flush. “I just...She was stabilized by your strike force  _ fifteen years _ before the Fall.” Tyrande tilted her head for a moment, then blanched at the implications. Velshada gave a weak smile. “Yeah. That’s a long time to spend in the woods, by yourself with no one to talk to, being hunted for sport. Most worgen who are still alive are either wolfcult, or they were bitten just around the Fall and never actually had to  _ live _ as worgen in Greymane’s reign. Plenty of them are the same hunters who tormented her for years, or they’re Genn ‘the only worgen who deserves a chance at treatment is me’ Fucking Greymane.”

“Please don’t fight the High Priestess,” Levaden whispered. Tyrande snorted.

“I’m not sorry, but...sorry.” Velshada hugged herself. “For a while it was just the two of us and...you’ve never seen someone like Talet have a sobbing panic attack in the middle of Elwynn Forest on a sunny day because she can’t handle being in  _ foxhunting _ country. Humans and worgen abandoned her or worse. The Forsaken are her  _ real  _ kin. And that makes them mine.”

Tyrande chose not to point out that Gilneas had been destroyed  _ by _ the Forsaken. Somehow, she got the vague impression that this girl’s master had spared few tears for her homeland.

_ Wolfsong, _ she realized.

“Your master must suffer without you,” she said, instead of prying into Levaden’s unexpectedly poetic streak.

“She’s all right. She’s helping in Lordaeron, but Suramar’s more stable so she’s happy I decided to take Valtrois up on her internship. Thank you, by the way.” Velshada gripped her harp case tightly. “For what you did for the worgen, Lady Whisperwind. You gave her freedom. Darnassus citizenship means she’ll never be bound to Genn Greymane again. If you hadn’t sent those ships, Talet would have defected to the Forsaken rather than follow him, and I never would have met her. Or  _ this  _ asshole,” she added, elbowing Levaden in the ribs.

“Ow. I was a gift from the heavens,” Levaden added, smug.

Velshada rolled her eyes. “She fell out of a tree in Feralas and landed on my head,” she translated. “And then Talet stabbed her because a screaming nightsaber just  _ fell out of a tree and landed on my head.” _

Outwardly, Tyrande smiled. Inwardly, some irrational part of her gave an irritable sigh. She  _ hated  _ admitting when Thalyssra was right.

_ Yes, yes, very well, _ she thought sharply, petulant over the least subtle deflection in the history of interrogations.  _ They are obviously spies. _

“Talet did  _ not  _ stab me,” came the correction. “She put a handaxe through my shoulderblade, which is much worse.”

“She apologized.” Velshada pressed a chaste kiss to her lover’s temple and smiled.

A flash of light from above drew Tyrande’s attention. It had come from somewhere on a high balcony; her mood soured further. Thalyssra had something reflective, then—it was an unsubtle reminder that she was being watched, and as polite a cue to wrap up her conversation before nightfall as Tyrande could reasonably have expected.

She had, perhaps, expected to find slightly more reverence in reaching out to her exiled people; but if nothing else she had  _ certainly  _ been pulled out of her own head. 

And...perhaps Velshada’s words about the Nightborne were not  _ entirely  _ without merit. Much as Tyrande still hated to admit anything of the sort.

“It gladdens me to know that you are safe,” she informed them both, quiet. Velshada looked up in surprise; Levaden jumped and scrambled to her feet.

“There are more of us,” she said. “A few dozen, I think. If you...is there anything you want us to tell them, or—we can bring them somewhere. They want to see you, my lady. It shouldn’t have been  _ me, _ it should have been a real druid at least...”

“I should go,” murmured Velshada. “I’m so sorry, High Priestess. It wasn’t me you wanted to talk to, I’m intruding.”

“Not at all.” Tyrande offered her a hand, helping Velshada stand while her hooves slipped on the wet stone. “I think you rarely speak of your pain, and you carry the grief for two. If your master is worthy of half the loyalty you show her, then I know she does not ask you to suffer her wounds on top of your own. If you have laid down some of your burdens, then my time was not wasted.”

Velshada smiled with her eyes and didn’t respond; Levaden, arm wound tight through her lover’s, looked up at Tyrande with nothing short of adoration. Tyrande nodded to her and reached out to brush her fingers along the young druid’s chin.

“Ma’am,” Levaden said awkwardly. “I mean...High Priestess—we don’t hate the Horde, or the Nightborne or the Forsaken or anything. But that doesn’t mean we’re not…angry. I meant it, we’re with you. Whatever you want, whenever you’re ready to—whenever you want us,” she corrected hastily. “Both of us. We’re better than you think we are, and if there’s ever anything you need...”

If there was ever anything Tyrande needed, she had a network of Sentinels, priestesses and Champions, but the offer was earnest and she was not cruel enough to mock it. For a moment, the set of Levaden’s ears had reminded her a bit of a very,  _ very _ young Shandris. Near-children, all, who had faced the Legion too young.

“I shall remember that,” she lied. “And the blessing of Elune goes with you. Though I had in fact intended to ask whether there was anything  _ you  _ might need, young one. I am restrained, not powerless.”

Levaden drew herself up proudly. “You don’t need to worry about us, High Priestess! Unless…” She glanced over her shoulder. “I don’t suppose you could get Thalyssra to let a gryphon through customs? Lightning’s important to Vel, she was a gift from Talet. And we miss flying.”

Tyrande failed to contain her wince. “I...will see what I can do, young one. But I fear the presence of an Alliance war gryphon would be far beyond my capacities to arrange.”

Velshada gave another shallow bow; Levaden, belatedly, jumped and tried unsuccessfully to mimic it. “Thank you anyway, Lady Whisperwind. She’s well cared for in Ironforge right now, and we knew it was a long shot. Even if it’s stupid. I mean, they let me keep Levaden and she’s  _ basically  _ a war mount. Before you say a  _ damn word,” _ she added without missing a beat or so much as glancing at her lover, “Remember that the Hand of Elune is literally standing right there.”

Levaden looked stricken. “You—that’s  _ entrapment!” _

Tyrande’s lips twitched. She glanced back up at the Nighthold, suppressed a heavy sigh, and took a step to her right and out from under the lip of the bridge—the wavebreak was in heavy shadow now, but Tyrande was wearing white and Thalyssra would be able to see her.

“That’s not  _ fair! _ You can’t just give me an opening like that and then—now  _ I’m  _ doing it too!”

Another pinprick flare of magic from that high balcony, and Tyrande closed her eyes as the walls of her prison closed around her once more.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is a bit exposition-heavy; but it's necessary to set some stuff up that I think will have some great payoff down the road if I've done it right.


	11. Ceasefire

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> WE'RE BACK. Took a break over finals week to recharge, write for some other fandoms, etc. I think my writing quality vastly improves as the result of these breaks! Happy to be back and I appreciate everyone's patience!
> 
> (You should also all go check out me and Kablob's Challenger series. It's far and away our best work, but because it's heavily original, it's having trouble getting traction and readership outside of our friends and most loyal subscribers. I think some of you guys, if you like the politics and such of this fic, would get a kick out of that one!)

The mild flare of arcane light faded without any sense of disorientation, this time.

Under less stress than Valtrois had been, and perhaps because she was taking care to ensure it, Thalyssra’s teleportation spell was gentler. Tyrande felt less as if she had been moved than as if the world had simply shifted around her, images stirred and solidifying once more like a scrying bowl. 

She had been left standing on the broad, stable balustrade along the edge of the First Arcanist’s balcony, on the moonlit side of a column. Without a word, Thalyssra held out an arm; Tyrande ignored her and stepped down from the barrier alone. Thalyssra let her arm drop without protest.

“In the future,” she said before Tyrande could walk away. When Tyrande paused, glancing over her shoulder and waiting, Thalyssra seemed more surprised than anything. Her train of thought actually faltered. “That is to say...among the shal’dorei, we rarely bother with true portals. Telemancy beacons allow us to eliminate the long casting times or the unnecessary drain of arcane power.” Her lips twitched. “And of course, travel is instantaneous. One might say we find the additional acts of stepping through a portal and then closing it to be too much like effort.”

Tyrande raised an eyebrow. Thalyssra was transparent; she  _ never  _ disparaged her people like this, even as a diplomatic ploy. This was a truly desperate attempt to sidle past Tyrande’s defenses, and she was a fool if she thought it would work.

The First Arcanist gave no indication she’d been caught out, however. “All of which is to say—if you prefer the use of a portal, in the future, I am more than capable of conjuring one. If it would be less frustrating than having spells cast on you directly, or if you would be more comfortable having…” She hesitated.  _ “Some _ agency, at least. Rather than being yanked through the aether.”

Tyrande’s ears twitched—but to do what, she couldn’t say.

“Your kindness,” she finally said, slowly, measured, “will be better spent on those to whom it means something.”

For a brief moment Thalyssra’s ears stiffened, mana flaring deep in her eyes; but the moment passed with a tired sigh.

“You would prefer me to be cruel, Tyrande?”

“I would  _ prefer  _ you treat me as a prisoner, and thus allow me at least the rights of any prisoner—to dream of escape and resent her captors.”

Thalyssra arched one silver eyebrow. “If I’ve tried to deny you either of those, my attempts have clearly failed.” When Tyrande only scoffed, she added, “You  _ already  _ have every right to hate me. I don’t need to lower myself to petty cruelties to help with that. Call it—pride, if nothing else. I won’t pretend to be a monster just to make your revenge fantasies more satisfying. So I’ve failed you again, in that sense.”

“You say that often enough.” Only a child’s voice, a quiet whisper about the  _ real  _ enemy who had come between their two peoples, kept enough bitterness out of Tyrande’s to maintain the peace. “Whatever obligation you feel to the Kaldorei has never been quite enough, it seems. I tire of hearing you lament it as you choose more  _ convenient  _ allies.”

“It wasn’t convenience.”

Tyrande couldn’t quite keep from letting her fangs show. “Convenient to your  _ pride, _ perhaps. The Kaldorei failed to fall on their knees in reverence at an echo of what we have chosen never to become again, and your honor could not survive the slight.”

“With  _ all  _ due respect, High Priestess, is it really  _ my  _ pride that—” 

Thalyssra cut herself off, pinching the bridge of her nose and raising a hand at Tyrande’s indignant response. After a moment, she shook her head, shoulders lowering.

“If this is the conversation we’re going to have tonight,” she said quietly, “Then perhaps it’s long overdue. But we can hold it inside.”

“You should wear shoes,” Tyrande retorted, but she stepped aside to let Thalyssra into her own quarters and out of the cold.

“It’s not that.” Thalyssra’s voice was grim. “I still have a few bottles of arcwine stashed away for a rainy day. If we’re having this conversation,  _ I’m _ having a drink.”

* * *

Much as Jaina hated to admit it...a walk had been good for her.

There was only so much taxation law a girl could process per 24-hour period. Unless a girl was Beverly Hale, and frankly, Beverly probably also needed to go outside once in a while. It was a relief to be outside in the chilly early-autumn sunset, with wood smoke in the air and the comforting sound of hooves and wagon wheels and  _ existence  _ in the background.

A stiff breeze swirled down the street, scattering red leaves and snatching Teelic’s patched cap off his head. Jaina lifted a hand to call it back as the young gnome clapped a hand to his head too late; but she was preempted by Teelic’s dog.

“Good girl, Frostbite!” he called to her. The big, whip-scarred white beast was taller at the shoulder than he was; Jaina suspected she was  _ far _ more than the fourth-generation wolf hybrid Teelic had described her as. But she had, of course, been a gift from Rinda—no doubt there was a story there—and as such was as precious to him as his own life.

Popular with the Forsaken door guard, as well. “Miss Tyra,” according to Teelic—the same woman who’d taken such a shine to scratching Rinda’s wife Talet behind the ears—had no objection to babysitting Frostbite on the days Teelic joined them. Apparently she was a dog person. Or had been.

Frostbite trotted back with Teelic’s hat in her teeth, tail waving like a warbanner as he cooed over her.

“Wheek,” said Malcolm, unimpressed, on Jaina’s shoulder.

Jaina tapped him gently on the nose. “Hush. Be nice.” To Teelic, as he settled his hat firmly back on his head, she said, “So, where were you planning to go?”

She’d intended to apologize for inviting herself along; Teelic was a young man who presumably had his own life and friends other than a rescued wolfdog. But he lit up at the question, and she decided her presence was clearly not completely unwelcome.

“Oh!” He half-skipped in excitement. “I didn’t have anywhere specific in mind. Do you have a preference? There’s the Red Tortoise, if you feel like something Pandaren. They’re a bit pricey, but worth it. The Iron Grizzly  _ isn’t _ worth it, Miss Jaina, don’t go there. I don’t know how they stay in business. And the Whistle’s too loud for my tastes, but good for takeaway. If you just want someplace quiet with good food, it’s only about a ten-minute walk from here to the Raven & Harp…”

Jaina followed in his wake, letting him chatter on as he pointed down side streets and gave her the visitor’s guide to the city, and her faint smile started to fade.

He was rattling off names like this was...normal. Like this was—like they were strolling down the streets of Stormwind, on a brisk autumn evening.

Everything looked so different that for a moment even Jaina had forgotten.

The multicolored flags fluttering in windows. The vague, incomprehensible background noise of a young city. The cats and skinny dogs in alleyways. The wagons jostling for position on thoroughfares, the couriers on well-groomed mounts trotting between them; merchants were closing up shop for the day, waving to their neighbors and anyone passing on the street. Men and women carried paper-wrapped packages home, children ducking under and around anyone in their paths.

For the first time, Jaina felt she almost understood what the Draenei must have felt like, standing in Shadowmoon Valley after Garrosh and his allies shattered the timestream.

This wasn’t— 

She couldn’t be here.

Most of Teelic’s casually-recommended taverns were completely unfamiliar names. Places that didn’t exist, except that now they did. Worse were the ones that Jaina  _ did  _ know. The ones she’d  _ been _ to, signs either weathered but intact or identical but jarringly brand-new. Unknown faces behind the bar. This was a city of reanimated corpses, after all.

She’d said from the beginning, hadn’t she said from the very  _ beginning _ that the dead ought to be left to rest?

Everything seemed so ordinary until you took a second look.

The bands of children covered every color of the rainbow. A musclebound orc struggled to keep his stack of packages balanced; one fell off the top, and a young woman dressed in dark Gilnean style picked it up and tucked it into the crook of his arm.

Even the traffic made her throat close. She hadn’t been paying attention. Hadn’t realized how many of the wagons were pulled by irritable hawkstriders or skeletal mockeries of horses, how many flame-red riding wolves were waiting patiently at clogged crossroads to let tired Arathi mustangs haul laden carts through the intersection.

A blonde human woman darted past on a massive black raptor, forcing Teelic to leap back into Jaina’s knees to make room. It startled a Blood Knight sentry’s beautiful charger, and he shouted and jerked at the reins, checking the stallion harshly as it tried to toss its head. A troll riding a dusty grey mule appeared at his side out of nowhere, snagging the whip from his hands before he could raise it.

“Oh, not again,” sighed Teelic.

The Blood Knight shouted something that for  _ some reason _ Kael had never bothered to teach Jaina the translation of, kicking and jerking his mount around to face her. The mule, at an invisible signal, sidestepped delicately while the poor Quel’dorei charger was dragged back into oncoming traffic and dumped its rider into a kodo’s backside.

The span of a heartbeat put the mule rider at its side; she danced her mount in a tight circle with only the fingers of one hand on the reins and snagged the panicked charger’s bridle without a word, clucking soothingly to it as she unclipped something and guided it away from the press.

“She’s right, you know,” Teelic said, disapproving. “If he doesn’t have the skill for such a harsh curb bit, he shouldn’t use one. He’s going to  _ ruin _ that horse. It’s okay, Frostbite,” he added, with the explanation, “She doesn’t like shouting. Or whips. Or strangers. It’s all right girl, see? They’re getting it talked out already...”

Jaina wasn’t paying attention.

She and Frostbite suddenly felt like the only people in the world with any common sense. The walls were too solid and too close; and Jaina was too much of one thing and not enough of the other to exist in this world. 

Jaina had belonged here, once.

This couldn’t be Lordaeron; but it felt so much like it, looked so much like it, even some of the names were the same. As Sylvanas Windrunner bore so  _ close _ a resemblance to the blazingly brave Ranger-General of Silvermoon. As Jaina Proudmoore had repeatedly failed to die when her soul did, when someone  _ different _ walked away with her body.

She was no more born to be a killer than Teelic Silverspark’s beloved pet was born to be a wolf—but it was in her blood, showed in her eyes and her hair and the scars she bore, inescapable, damning. Making her wild on the edges, unpredictably savage; unable to be left alone, unable to be trusted, unsuitable for a peaceful society.

And yet, and yet, and yet. How many times had Jaina ignored wild-animal fear? How many times had she refused to give in to it?

How many  _ times  _ had her faith been proven wrong?

This was all wrong. The center could not hold. This wasn’t  _ real. _

She thought she heard someone calling her name but couldn’t recognize any other sound.

And how should she? The press of voices and indistinct shouting of any city, any minor traffic entanglement, were one thing—but there was another layer here, the voices unintelligible not due to anger or overlapping but because no two were speaking the same language. And yer Teelic had been right; there was irritation but no blood, no drawn weapons, only gestures and waves of understanding as the situation got itself sorted out again. 

This time.

Jaina had wanted a city just like this for so long, longer than she could bear, but she had given up on it for a reason.

The multicolored flags she’d so casually admired upon stepping out—Horde and Alliance banners flying defiantly across the street at one another. A Darnassian silver oak doing its best to outshine the darker symbol of the Dusk Lily hanging in its neighbor’s doorway. Gilnean storm-grey, Forsaken midnight-purple, and Stormwind royal blue threatened to overwhelm one cluster of homes; a street further down boasted the sigil of the Naaru alongside the Orgrimmar jagged shield, a Darkspear talisman hanging between them that Jaina didn’t know the meaning of. Whatever unlikely cluster of roommates the collection represented, there was no way of knowing which faction was responsible for their broken windows.

This was Lordaeron. She could no longer put on lenses and pretend it was a strange new city. She knew the streets, the walls, the very cobblestones too well for that. It was  _ Lordaeron, _ but it wasn’t, but it  _ was. _

And she knew how Lordaeron’s story had to end.

“Miss Jaina.” Teelic’s high, delicate voice was firm. “Miss Jaina, ma’am, you need to sit down—”

“I’m sorry,” she gasped. A frost nova threw him back into Frostbite and froze all six of their feet to the pavement; and then a plume of unstable arcane energy swept up around her, and Jaina vanished.

* * *

Tyrande had been deposited on a low sofa in Thalyssra’s sitting room.

Neither of them had made much use of the room since Tyrande’s...arrival. It was, as most of the Nighthold, entirely too much. The sole saving grace was that the furniture was comfortable enough, the lighting was dimmer and less harsh than in most of the residency, and there was a solid oak door that could be closed for privacy.

With a weary sigh, the First Arcanist let herself back into the room with two wine glasses and a bottle of arcwine that might more accurately be called a jug.

Tyrande could not entirely disagree with the sentiment.

Thalyssra managed to avoid eye contact for several more minutes by pulling a crystal decanter from under the table and taking her time in serving the wine. Eventually, however, she had run out of ways to put off the inevitable.

Leaving a glass within Tyrande’s reach but making no attempt to offer it to her, Thalyssra set the decanter beside it and moved to an armchair, safely across the table. She sat down, the only sign of tension a worryingly hard grip on the delicate stem of her glass, and waited.

When it became obvious that Tyrande was not going to make this easier for her, the First Arcanist winced and shifted her grip on the wine glass.

“Yes, well,” she muttered. “I suppose I haven’t earned that. Where do you want me to start? Shall we retread every bitterness since the War of the Ancients? The barrier? My failure to stop Elisande before she sold us to the Legion once more? I  _ tried, _ Tyrande.”

“The mistakes of the past are irrelevant now. What has been done cannot be changed.” The coldness in her voice made Thalyssra’s ears twitch back, but back and down; fear, not anger. A flinch. It was unexpected enough that Tyrande made an effort to soften her tone, just slightly, as she continued. “You might begin with explaining to me how you can claim a sense of  _ obligation _ to the Kaldorei, while bowing to the warlord who slaughtered us in the thousands in order to occupy our home by force. Who even now holds us hostage against the cooperation of our allies.”

Thalyssra nodded quietly, almost to herself. She swirled the rich, dark arcwine in its glass, gazing into it for several long moments.

“I have an answer to that,” she said finally. “And you’re not going to like it. But if you  _ want _ to understand—the question you should be asking is why I chose to join the Shal’dorei to the Horde in the first place.”

Tyrande’s eyes narrowed. Still, she was careful. Thalyssra was offering the explanations Tyrande had seethed over never receiving; that was reason enough to, if not offer an olive branch, at least respect the fact that they met tonight under a flag of truce.

“I care less for that decision,” she said carefully, “than for the fact that you have not reconsidered your allegiance in light of the Horde’s actions since. But very well. Explain yourself, then.”

If Thalyssra objected to her phrasing, she gave no indication. A dark, elegant finger tapped idly on the side of her glass; after a moment, she said, “Redemption.”

Tyrande considered this answer. Silently, she sat forward and picked up the drink that had been left for her; she suddenly felt she was going to need it for the rest of this conversation. Thalyssra’s lips twitched in solidarity, and Tyrande rolled her eyes. 

Thalyssra shifted to sit more comfortably as Tyrande took a fortifying sip of arcwine. It was...the most disgusting thing she’d ever tasted, actually. Maintaining a straight face was the result of ten thousand years of discipline and a desperate prayer to the Goddess for strength. It was like drinking pure, rotten sugar over which someone had idly waved grape-scented perfume, with an aftertaste suggesting the perfume had then been poured directly onto Tyrande’s tongue.

Thalyssra ran a thumb over the lip of her own glass but didn’t drink. Tyrande tried very hard not to attribute that to malicious foresight on the part of the First Arcanist.

“Both Horde and Alliance,” she said slowly, “have been victims and perpetrators of...horrific atrocities. As have the Kaldorei, in our time. I say  _ our,” _ she said, glancing up. “We both remember Azshara’s empire. We both revered her when we were young. I took too long to question the imperialism, I know that now. What was done to the Zandalari...The Nightborne bear that shame now. Alone, I think;  _ you _ changed. Rejected the legacy of empire. The reparations are mine to bear.”

Tyrande inclined her head. False reassurance would do neither of them any good.

“Mmm.” Thalyssra ran a finger around the rim of her untouched wine. “The orcs attempted to conquer a planet by force, corrupted by the Legion; the humans responded with enslavement and cruelty. The Darkspear have their own bloody history—Silvermoon can never wash away the sins they committed against the Amani. Gilneas and its insular, reactive politics nearly doomed a generation, the Kaldorei were even worse after millennia of isolation—don’t deny it—and that all pales in comparison to the terrible things the Forsaken have done for vengeance, or out of fear. The Apothecaries. The Scarlet Crusade. The internment camps and the genocide of the Draenei. There are no innocents, Tyrande. We’ve always hated each other too much.”

“You claim there is no  _ difference?” _ Tyrande didn’t bother containing her disdain. It was a weak, deliberately obtuse argument, the opposite of any kind of justification.

To her surprise, it got no rise from Thalyssra.

“I don’t,” she said, even and calm. “I never said that. On the whole, if pressed—I think the Alliance has historically conducted itself with better grace, closer to morality, though their hands are as bloody as anyone’s. But the Horde...acknowledges its history. The crimes of its past. The Alliance, from speaking to their representatives...the Alliance rarely even tries.”

Tyrande opened her mouth; then, slowly, closed it. There were several things she wanted to say—and no real answer to make to the accusation.

Thalyssra offered a sad smile. “I told you. I make my choices based on what I believe is right for Suramar. We did not need allies who looked at our silk hangings and delicate way of life and saw soft, tender victims in need of rescue. We did not need allies who would sponge away our culpability, as if Elisande were an aberration, as if much of our race did not flock to her shadow, believe in her vitriol. As we once did Azshara’s.”

She inclined her head gracefully to Tyrande, the echo of an old, bitter conversation ringing between them. Tyrande nearly returned the gesture, but paused.

“Pretty words, First Arcanist.” She forced herself to take another awful, cloying sip of arcwine that she fervently wished were poisoned, just so that she would die before putting any more of it in her mouth. “Do you think I have forgotten your resentment? You turned to the arms of the Horde only after I made it clear you would  _ not _ be absolved of Suramar’s...imprudence.”

Thalyssra listened, only holding up two fingers when Tyrande was clearly finished speaking anyway.

“Yes,” she acknowledged. “Surrounded by Alliance who saw only...cultured refinement, gentility, things they view as civilized and pure...we would not have been given motivation to grow, only to stagnate. To reestablish the comforts we had grown accustomed to, and the attitudes that came with them. And the Kaldorei would always have hated us, always have been waiting for us to prove our lack of worth. Yes, I believed my people deserved more than that. Better than your constant resentment.”

Tyrande resisted the urge to hiss. She surprised herself, with how calm her response was. “You believed the Horde would provide a cleaner slate.”

“Yes. And no. I believed the Horde would provide a drive toward  _ change. _ We needed to move forward, not back. We needed allies who also struggle with the ghosts of their past. Who choose not to forget their mistakes, what hatred and unthinking bigotry can drive a people toward—but also choose not to be defined by those mistakes. Who would allow  _ us _ to decide what we wanted to become.” A rare, genuine smile, mirth that actually reached Thalyssra’s eyes. “And perhaps we needed a bit of cultural shaming, as well. Without any personal baggage. I may not have been  _ happy _ the first time an entire nation responded to Suramar with abject disgust, but it certainly taught me a lesson about extravagance. You may look down on us for our excesses, Tyrande, but before we had orcs in the city to rant about durability and the definition of a high-quality good, it was  _ much _ worse.”

Tyrande snorted softly, deciding to knock back the rest of the absolutely repulsive arcwine while she was still in a good mood. Ah. Yes, that was more than enough to eliminate any stirrings of good will toward the Shal’dorei.

“Teldrassil,” she said.

Nodding, Thalyssra took a long, deep breath.

“By which I assume you mean, why have I not withdrawn Suramar from the Horde, in response to its unprovoked attack on Darnassus?”

Tyrande raised an eyebrow in a manner she hoped communicated that she hadn’t exactly been asking about Thalyssra’s vacation plans.

The First Arcanist’s smile was tight, not quite pained but skirting close.

“I don’t believe the attack was unprovoked,” she said quietly. “Not truly.”

Tyrande went very still.

Thalyssra’s knuckles were still white around her drink; but her shoulders were low and soft, calm. Centered.

“I told you you wouldn’t like it,” she murmured.

Tyrande felt silver fury rippling under her skin. She controlled it. For now.

“I take it,” she bit out, “that you have  _ some  _ kind of explanation as to what, precisely, you mean by that.”

“Stormheim,” Thalyssra responded.

Tyrande’s ears flicked dismissively. “Windrunner’s feud with King Greymane is their own business,” she said, voice cold. “If she did not wish to be challenged, she should not have sought to bind a goddess. For all her talk of free will, of being more than the Lich King—”

“I wasn’t talking about Eyir,” Thalyssra interrupted. “I have no way of knowing with certainty what happened there, but having read both Alliance and Horde accounts—while I may find Greymane’s motivations reprehensible, I think we can both agree that enslaving any creature is never the answer. I sympathize with the plight of the Forsaken; I will not excuse her actions in trying to solve it. I was referring to the attack on the Forsaken fleet.”

Tyrande didn’t manage to contain her wince that time. Perhaps controlling her reaction to the arcwine had sapped her strength.

“Anduin did not approve that strike,” she said, knowing the truth was not enough.

“I give him that much credit and more,” Thalyssra allowed with a gracious nod. “But it was carried out. And Greymane faced no censure, not publically or in any way that held consequence. Of course he didn’t; we were in the middle of a war. And I freely acknowledge that the Stormheim front was before my time. I may be misinformed.”

Tyrande had too much integrity to play along. “I imagine your knowledge is equivalent to mine. Greymane’s forces saw their chance and took it, destroying both fleets in the process. And yes. There was an unspoken agreement, at the time, that we would act if not as allies then neither as enemies. I fail to see what that has to do with Teldrassil.”

“No,” Thalyssra said, not unkindly. “You don’t.”

This time Tyrande did hiss, but there was no heat behind it. “Windrunner perceived the Stormheim attack as an act of war, then? A war she continued once the threat of the Legion no longer hung over our heads. A paltry excuse. She might have sued for peace. Made diplomatic overtures for Greymane to be held accountable.”

“She should have,” Thalyssra agreed. She sounded exhausted. “I never said...I don’t  _ approve, _ Tyrande. Please believe that much. There were other ways. But the fact remains that the last time the Warchief assumed a state of peace would hold, the High King’s closest advisor attacked her without warning or permission during joint operations, and faced no consequences. And I...cannot blame her, for believing that a treachery committed once will be committed again.”

Tyrande wanted so badly to hate her for that.

Thalyssra examined her face for several long moments, then gave another tired smile. “So there you have it. I joined the Horde because I respected them more than the Alliance; I follow Sylvanas Windrunner because as brutal as her methods are, I believe she is in the right. I still feel the debt I owe the Kaldorei, and regret losing the chance to make up for our failure to be the brothers and sisters you deserved; and yet here we are.”

Tyrande looked her in the eye. “Do you expect my absolution? My understanding? Are we to  _ agree to disagree, _ then, over the bones of my people?”

“No.”

After a long, long pause, Tyrande twitched her head in the barest impression of a nod. Thalyssra, seeming to understand that this was the best she would ever get, raised her glass in a cynical mockery of a toast before finally taking a drink.

She choked violently.

_ “Merciful Goddess, _ that’s revolting!”


	12. Ashes

Once upon a time, the crash of waves might have been a comfort.

Jaina closed her eyes, listening to the rush of the angry tide. There was a storm brewing; it was darker here in the ruins of Theramore than it had been in Lordaeron only an hour ago, even with the time difference.

Steel-gray water broke against the ruined seawalls, shattering like glass and misplaced hope.

But even agitated and unstable, the steady rise and fall of the waves was grounding. She tried to match her own breathing to this, the ebb and flow of Azeroth’s own lungs. She mostly failed.

What am I even doing here? she thought, despairing. What did I think I would find?

She’d  _ told _ Anduin this was a mistake. She’d said from the beginning she didn’t want any part of the Lordaeron project, the—the mad, obscene gamble of a nineteen-year-old’s foolish hope. 

At another time, the sensation of a portal forming behind her—here, of all places, in the condemned wreckage of her dreams and defensive walls—might have made her jump out of her skin.

She didn’t even twitch. She was...she was so, so tired.

A quiet sigh. “I thought I might find you here.”

Jaina pretended she hadn’t heard him.

“Jaina,” Anduin said softly. “At least wear a cloak. You’ll catch your death in this wind.”

The irony was too much. Jaina couldn’t contain a bitter laugh, and she nearly  _ heard _ Anduin cringing behind her.

“Rhonin should have saved himself,” she spat. “We’d all be better off.”

“Jaina.” She heard the rustle of fabric being shaken out, before a warm blue cloak was thrown around her shoulders—navy blue, not Stormwind royal. Lordaeron blue,  _ Theramore _ blue. “Don’t say—”

He cut himself off abruptly.

“Jaina,” he tried again.

_ “What,  _ Anduin?”

“Are you...there’s a rat in your hair.”

“Eek,” said Malcolm.

“That’s Malcolm,” said Jaina.

There was a slight pause.

“Of course,” said Anduin, with admirable composure. He tucked Jaina’s cloak firmly around her shoulders. “Jaina, you can’t honestly believe the world would be better off if you’d died here.”

“Wouldn’t it?” she asked, dully. “Vereesa would have her husband, the twins would have their father. Dalaran would have gone to someone else. Khadgar, maybe. Rhonin himself. Gods know  _ Kalec _ wouldn’t have lost his temper, that would require him to feel  _ passion  _ for something for once in his life. The Silver Covenant might have settled for less blood, if their commander hadn’t just lost her entire world. And I wouldn’t…”

After a moment, Anduin spoke up again. “And then you wouldn’t have to live with the loss?”

“A captain goes down with her ship, or she bears the curse of that shame for the rest of her life,” Jaina breathed. “I was never  _ meant _ to outlive them.”

“Wheek.” Malcolm did not, apparently, approve.

Turning on her heel, Jaina plucked the rat off her shoulder and handed him to Anduin as she paced.

“Jaina…”

_ “You _ brought it up, not me,” she snapped. “I only wanted to clear my head.  _ Alone?” _

“You came to  _ Theramore _ to clear your head? Jaina...please. Talk to me. What happened?”

“What  _ happened?” _ She whirled on him. “I  _ told _ you I didn’t want to be part of this! I told you I wanted  _ nothing _ to do with Lordaeron! I can’t pour everything I am into a city like this again, I don’t have anything left to  _ give! _ You’re asking me to believe that the Horde and the Alliance can live side by side. That at the end of the day, faction conflicts happen between leaders and political slogans, that the everyday people on both sides just want to live in safety. That if we try hard enough we can make it work, and I can’t  _ do _ this anymore, Anduin! I can’t!”

Thunder rolled, out over the sea. Anduin, holding a rat in his hands as it started to rain, took a step toward her; Jaina threw a frost nova at his feet.

“You’re asking me to  _ care,” _ she spat. “And it’s working. For a moment I was foolish enough to let it. But I won’t. Not this time.  We should never have let ourselves fall for this trick again.”

“What trick?” he asked gently.

_ “Hope!” _ Jaina threw her hands in the air. “The one where we think if we only try living together we can forget our entire history. We let ourselves get entangled with the Horde as if it’s not going to just  _ break _ someday, and when it does we’re trapped alongside them and it all ends in blood and betrayal on both sides.” Suddenly tired, she rubbed her face and took a shuddering breath. “That’s the only way this ever goes. I should know. I’m Azeroth’s resident  _ expert _ in foolish hope. And the slaughter it brings in the end.”

With difficulty and the sound of splintering ice, Anduin finally managed to yank his foot free. Malcolm, still held in one hand as the King of Stormwind pinwheeled wildly for balance, squealed with indignation and received a murmured apology.

Jaina didn’t have the energy to be angry anymore.

“Some wounds are too deep to heal, Anduin. Even for you.” She ran fingers through her wet hair; it had started to rain in earnest, freezing cold and merciless. “Sometimes all you can do is make sure that when the axe falls, the cut will be as clean as possible. All this stupid game ever does is make things ten times more painful when it all falls apart.”

Spent, she leaned back against a ruined wall, and sank down it. Rain poured off her cloak and under her collar as she hugged her knees. After a long moment, with a sigh, Anduin sat down nearby. Jaina waved her hand and summoned a crystalline arcane matrix over his head, halting the falling rain in its tracks.

Anduin glanced above her own head. “Not going to summon one for yourself?”

“I’m fine,” Jaina growled.

He rolled his eyes. “Auntie, you look like a drowned ra—ravasaur,” he corrected hastily with a glance at Malcolm.

“I said I’m  _ fine, _ Anduin.”

With a quiet sigh, he let the matter drop. There was silence for several long minutes, except for the rain and the growling thunder.

“I’m sorry,” he finally said, voice soft. “Jaina, I’m sorry. I pushed you into this.”

It was true, so Jaina didn’t bother to protest.

Anduin stroked Malcolm between the ears as they looked out over the stormy ocean. “I never intended to cause you so much pain. But you...you don’t have to fix the world, Jaina. I didn’t ask you to be part of this project because you’re brilliant, or an experienced stateswoman, or an expert in protective wards, or even because you’re one of the only people I know who’s actually  _ founded _ a city from the ground up before.”

Jaina gave a mirthless smile. “Given my track record, I don’t blame you.”

“Stop that,” he said firmly. “Jaina, everything you’ve ever done that was  _ magnificent, _ it was never about grand arcane displays or even about willpower and visionary statesmanship. It was always about being able to look a hated enemy in the eye and see a person. Of all the things you ever taught me, it’s the one lesson I’ll never forget.”

“You should try.” Jaina watched lightning flash on the horizon without seeing it. “I was wrong.”

“Is that  _ you _ talking?” Anduin eyes were harder around the edges than she remembered. “Or your father?”

She glared, but didn’t answer him.

“Jaina,” he asked. “Are you afraid the Lordaeron reconstruction will fail?”

“I think I’ve made that fairly obvious, Anduin.”

He just looked at her. “Are you afraid it will fail?” he repeated. “Or are you afraid that it might  _ succeed?” _

Jaina stared at him. After a long moment, she snapped her fingers; the umbrella spell dissolved, dumping a several-inch layer of collected rainwater on his head all at once.

With an angry squeal, Malcolm fled down Anduin’s arm and under Jaina’s hood, puffing out his fur and furiously beginning to groom himself.

“Are you implying I would  _ sabotage—” _

“No! Light, Jaina, of course not. I only meant...Jaina, I’m a priest. I like to think I’m a pretty good one.”

She shot him a look at the apparent non sequitur, and tapped Malcolm with a drying spell as she pointedly looked away from her beloved nephew.

Anduin fruitlessly brushed water off his sleeves. When he spoke again, his voice was low and careful.

“They tell you about the warmth of the Light,” he said. “As an acolyte. They tell you of its mercy and its power, and they warn you about the drain. But they talk about healing and light and relief. They never tell you that it  _ burns. _ Not only when you wield the Light as a weapon. It burns when you heal, like fire in your veins. It hurts. If you don’t know what you’re doing, it can kill you.”

“Get to the  _ point.” _

“Well,” Anduin said, slowly. “I think that...if Lordaeron succeeds, then it means you were right. That you’ve always been right. That the Horde are no more intrinsically monsters than the Alliance. And if you were right all along, then you would have to stop hating—”

“The Horde?” Jaina supplied. Magic crackled between her fingers. “Do you think I  _ like  _ this, Anduin? That I carry this much anger for fun? I spent my life—” 

_ “Yourself,” _ Anduin corrected. Jaina’s jaw snapped shut.  _ “For _ believing it your whole life. If Lordaeron works, then you weren’t stupid for advocating peace, and nothing that happened was your fault for being naive. You couldn’t blame yourself anymore. For the theft of the Divine Bell, for the Kirin Tor’s neutrality in Pandaria. For your father’s death. You would have to stop hating yourself for Theramore. And if you did that, you would have to let yourself mourn for them instead. I don’t think you have, yet. Just because it’s healthy, just because it will let you heal—I told you. I  _ know  _ it still burns.”

For a very long time, until she knew she could control her voice and her raging magic, Jaina kept her head in her arms and listened to the rain.

“I want it to work,” she said finally.

It was true. That was the  _ point. _ She’d forgotten to be angry, somehow. She’d let herself become...distracted. Charmed.  _ Invested. _ And for a deadly moment she’d almost let herself forget that it was a fool’s errand. That everything she built would crumble to dust around her someday. The city was a powder keg, just waiting for a spark, and Jaina was  _ tired _ …

The routine, the change of setting and the company had been good for her until she remembered what she was doing. Challenging, interesting, and different enough from anything she’d done before that she only rarely tripped headlong over painful memories. Jaina  _ strongly _ suspected Beverly and Teelic had been conspiring to keep reference materials in Arthas’ hand or bearing his name out of her reach unless she specifically asked for them. And that, too...it was a  _ kindness, _ tempting her to forget the cruelties of the world, even if Beverly’s main motivation was probably fear of the blue-blooded aristocracy destroying her records to impede her quest for justice from its uncaring financial institutions.

“...doesn’t even make any sense,” she muttered.

Anduin tilted his head. “Beg pardon?”

“Twelve hundred gold. It’s been twenty years, Anduin!”

“Jaina…?”

“She  _ has _ to be entitled to at least five thousand in accrued interest by now. And that’s assuming punitive fines even  _ have  _ a fee cap when the hypothetical defendant is the Crown treasury—”

Anduin, laughing in abject delight, flung an arm around her shoulders and butted his head gently against her temple. Unable to resist him, Jaina managed a weak smile and nudged him back.

“It’s all going to fall apart,” she said softly. “I may as well be  _ certain  _ I did everything I could.”

* * *

Something crashed wildly through the undergrowth.

That shouldn’t, technically, be  _ possible _ in the Emerald Dream. But the Dream was only a reflection of the untouched natural world; how a druid  _ understood _ it, how she interacted with it, came down to her own perceptions.

And to the powder-blue Darkspear tigress crouching beneath the ferns,  _ tracking prey _ meant sound and scent.

In reality the young Kaldorei moonkin thrashing his way through every twig and dead leaf on the reflection of Teldrassil was likely moving in total silence, from  _ his  _ perspective. But he was young. His training, while clearly competent, was not high-level or refined; that he’d gotten this far at all meant he had skill and talent, but he just wasn’t good enough to mask his presence in the Dream. His radiated magical signature registered, to the Darkspear, as graceless woodsmanship.

And he was not supposed to be here.

_ None _ of the Kaldorei druids on Teldrassil were meant to enter the Dream. Several—the oldest, the subtlest and most skilled—had tried it. A few had been killed; more, when they realized they had been discovered, had managed to flee back to their bodies without being identified. The Warchief was more than a little paranoid about the possibility of Horde patrols missing one or two of them.

Realistically, they had. But there was little enough risk, for all that. There would never be a reliable information flow that way; the Cenarion Circle was clinging to its neutrality; and any druid slipping out through the Dream had to run a gauntlet  _ twice,  _ both leaving and returning.

The fact that they’d seen a recent surge in young striplings like this one meant the patrols were working. The older, more experienced druids were no longer willing to run the risk for so little reward. Young druids had a rightful respect for their elders’ hard-won skill; it was a rare student who would try his own skill in this situation rather than trust that his teacher had it well in hand. If the students were testing the border, it meant their teachers had given up.

A black bear roared in the distance, the reverberating brassy undertone marking it as Highmountain. The frantic crashing undergrowth changed direction, and a ghostly wine-colored moonkin stumbled into the ferns. 

The tigress broke cover. It was over in seconds; three surging strides and a leap, and the young kaldorei barely had time to turn before she’d bowled him over, rolling over him in the false dirt of the Dream.

It was over, but the boy had fight in him yet. The Dream warped around them; shapeshifting was different here, everything a transparent imitation of reality, but that only made it easier to keep her ‘claws’ in him as his energy swirled, cloaking itself in the shape of a nightsaber and then a rearing grizzly, before fangs sank into his throat.

_ Be quiet, boy, _ the tigress thought at him, irritated.  _ I’m not going to kill you. _

More out of surprise than anything, the young druid stopped struggling.

The tigress released him as he dropped his summoned form, sitting on top of him with her tail around her paws and licking her transparent claws clean with a tongue that didn’t actually exist.

“There,” she said. Her ears flicked forward in a friendly manner at his visible surprise when she spoke in accented but fluent Darnassian. “Breathe, or however it works in the Dream. Circle druids don’t hunt novices like wild boar where I come from.”

“Oh.” His presence felt like he’d be panting if he had a physical body. “How did you find me?”

She didn’t dignify that with an answer.

“Go home,” she ordered.

“I can’t do that. I have to find help. Please, if you’re on our side—”

“I never said  _ that, _ I said I wasn’t going to kill you. Who do you think can send you help that isn’t already trying?”

Metaphorically, he pressed his lips together.

The tigress rolled her eyes. “Give me a name and a location and I’ll pass your message along.”

“Oh,  _ sure  _ you will! Let me go! If you  _ really  _ see me as a student to your master, you’ll let me do what I can to protect my people.”

“As you wish.” He blinked in shock, but the tigress didn’t move. “I’m a brawler, not a Cenarion master; being better at this than  _ you  _ isn’t saying much. I may be shielding you for now, but that’s only because the rest assume you’re dead. I’ll let you go. You can either follow the path I marked for you back to your body, quietly, where no one will notice you, or you can run for it. I won’t stop you, and I won’t raise any alarms. But I’m not stepping in front of stronger druids than I am to protect you from your own stupidity. You’re a fawn among wolves. The moment you move, they’ll find you, and they’ll tear you apart.”

“Then help me!”

“Do what? Kill yourself?” She stepped off him, rolling languidly onto her side. “You’re doing  _ that  _ just fine alone. Go on, then, if you really think you can help anyone this way.”

Ghostly ears pinned back in anger; but finally, resentfully, the young druid slipped into the form of a nightsaber and ducked back along the tigress’ trail, vanishing into the ferns.

The tigress sighed. Sometimes you had to be cruel to be kind.

After several minutes, a bronze shimmer and a rush of ethereal wings announced the arrival of her patrol partner. The golden eagle shot her a judgemental look.

“I saw that,” he said.

“I wasn’t hiding it.”

“Vazkri, you can’t keep doing this.”

A pale blue tail-tip flicked. “Most of them learn the lesson. Do your people usually kill foolish young men with the courage to fight back against their oppressors? Mine tend to honor them.”

“We kill them when they’re our  _ enemies,” _ the eagle said pointedly.

Vazkri, the tigress, idly licked her chest. “I  _ like _ killing enemies. So, you go find me one, and I’ll kill it for you.”

“That’s the third time this month.”

“And those are only the ones you know about!”

“Don’t say things like—Someone is  _ going _ to notice!”

Vazkri ignored him and closed her eyes. After anything complicated like that takedown, it was always a good idea to check how much time had passed in the real world.

_ Kemm? _ She thought into the aether.  _ Time check. _

She felt the ghostly sensation of big, coarse orcish hands gently stroking her fur. Her brother—her  _ real _ partner, not her military-assigned patrol companion—was no druid to put it lightly, but they were close. Close enough that, if he kept contact with her physical body while it slept, she could always reach him from the Dream.

_ It’s just past midnight, _ he sent back.  _ Is something wrong? You sound annoyed. _

_ I always sound annoyed, _ she reminded him cheerfully. 

_ You’re an actual diplomat, Vaz. You never sound annoyed even when you are, _ he reminded her, sounding annoyed.

She chuckled, earning another irritated look from her tauren counterpart.  _ Anything to report? _

Everything seems normal here, he answered, sending her an image of their little camp inside a Horde fortification in the east.. She felt an affectionate scritch between her ears, and purred as if he could hear her. She also felt Kemm hesitate.  _ Actually, Sasha’s acting a bit strange. She keeps pulling at her tether. There aren’t elf druids in hiding out there, are there? _

Vazkri stood.  _ There shouldn’t be. That’s one of the most heavily patrolled sections of the Dream, we would have noticed something as obvious as real-world troop movements. _ “Rainhide,” she said out loud. “Eastern front, we have a patrol there?”

“Obviously. We’re not changing our patrol route, Vazkri.”

"Then what…” Vazkri frowned, rearing up to brace massive paws against the nearest monolith of a tree as she sent the Dream warping around her like funhouse mirrors. Some sections zoomed in as if under a gnomish microscope; others, simultaneously, blew into wide perspective like the view from a wildly overpowered goblin rocket in flight.

“Vazkri, I’m serious.” The eagle fluttered from where he’d been gripping the image of a tree to land on her shoulder. “You have a good heart, but I’d like to see it keep beating. Honoring a young warrior’s courage means treating him as a viable threat, not wiping his bottom for him and sending him home with a sternly-worded—”

“Be quiet,” she murmured.

“You need to hear this. I  _ know  _ you, you used to be a complete cynic! I don’t know when you started risking your skin for idiots like that but this is war, you have to—”

“No,  _ be quiet.”  _

Rainhide’s beak snapped shut as he realized Vazkri was scenting the air, tongue curled, eyes closed in concentration. Slowly, her ears folded back and she turned to look him in the eye.

“Do you smell smoke?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, to answer a question from a chapter or two back: While characters with virulent hatred for entire other factions are unlikely to get much of a highlight because it would kind of go against the tone and purpose of the fic, it's not going to be all Alliance characters showing support for the Horde. There ARE Horde members other than Beverly "Faction Politics Are The Opiate Of The Masses And Serve Only To Prevent The Proletariat From Uniting Against Our True Oppressors: Blizzard Executives" Hale who know damn well who their real enemies are and would much rather calm the fuck down for like, one expansion? Singular? Two goddamn fucking years to grow my vegetables in peace? I'm begging you, man--


	13. Better To Ask Forgiveness

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey guys! I'm still here! Things have been weird, huh. As y'all may have noticed, a) the RWBY season part B destroyed me as usual so I got bit by that writing bug pretty hard b) midterms happened. C) I got a cat! Her name is Nepenthe, she's a solid black shorthair with gold eyes, and she's the best thing in the universe. And that's it. There are zero other things of note happening currently. Absolutely nothing whatsoever.
> 
> Now to take a BIG sip of water and check the CDC website.
> 
> In all seriousness: I remain committed to this fic! It's not going anywhere, updates will just remain slow moving forward. I hope some of you who are into RWBY will come and check out those fics, and I really do invite you all to take a look at me and Kablob's original Star Trek series. I think you'd have a good time.
> 
> In the meantime: The girls are back and they're FIGHTING.

The taste of ash hung thick in the air. Sylvanas closed her eyes and breathed deep.

Viciously, she thought, _ fools. _ And yet that did not, somehow, ring true…

At her side, Nathanos gave a hard snort. “We might have let it burn. Why save the Alliance from their own folly? Would that wildfire not have turned the favor of the Kaldorei against these so-called resistance movements? Setting fire to their own tree. Idiots.”

After several long moments, Sylvanas opened her eyes again.

The lingering ash stung at them. She did not blink.

“No,” she replied. “Allowing Teldrassil to burn gains us nothing. I need—the _ Horde _ needs—the World Tree as a bargaining chip.”

“Nice catch,” Nathanos muttered under his breath. Sylvanas shot him a look, and he winced.

_ “Furthermore,” _ she continued as if not interrupted. Nathanos snorted again. “It would not. Swift action to mitigate the damage, Horde champions placing themselves at risk to quench a wildfire begun by a reckless Resistance with no clear plan? That will do _ far _ more to incline the population toward acceptance of their fate than allowing these rebels to be remembered as desperate martyrs, and the Horde as cruel and ruthless for doing nothing to protect the civilians in our _ care. _ It was a Horde officer, after all, who lit the fuse.”

“So we think,” corrected Nathanos. He wrinkled his nose. “Not that there’s much left of him to tell by.”

Sylvanas’ mood darkened further. Lip twisting, she hissed, “He has no idea how _ lucky _that makes him.”

Had there been anything left to raise, anything at all…

It was only her own judgement that had saved them. She’d never trusted that one—too jingoistic by half, too much a warhawk. Little had _ he _ known that his top-secret outpost was a decoy; the vast majority of the actual Azerite bomb stores were commanded by her own Dark Rangers and none lesser. The ordinary gunpowder explosives had done quite enough damage; but she would have to be mad, and far more so than even Greymane believed, to have given the man access to actual Azerite charges.

But decoy or no—he had no right. He had no business allowing an open flame within fifty feet of that outpost at all without express permission. Acting on his own initiative, against her _ explicit _ instructions…

“The bodies?” Nathanos’ voice was carefully inflectionless. “The Horde soldiers are burned nearly past recognition, but there may be something salvageable. The Kaldorei…”

Sylvanas glanced to the left.

The Kaldorei besieging what they clearly believed to be a genuine Azerite store had been within the blast radius, but largely outside the heart of the fireball. Most of their bodies had been scorched to bone in the resulting wildfire, before Tauren and Darkspear and Orcish shamans had been able to fight the flames back under control. But not all. The whims of fate always spared some flesh.

“Identify what family you can,” she responded, feeling dark rage hardening in her chest. “Let it be made clear to them that I desire _ answers _ as to how this was allowed to happen. There are protocols in place for armed rebellion that were broken here, Nathanos. This reactionary, shortsighted fool has placed me in the position of making _ amends, _ and has managed to go unpunished. Secure the intact bodies. If surviving family fails to make sufficient effort to reclaim them within a week of being notified…”

Nathanos inclined his head, tilting it slightly after a pause. “I will make… _ sufficient _ effort to identify any surviving family members, my lady. Such a shame that scarring and the communications embargo will make that difficult. There is a very real risk of someone falling through the cracks.”

Sylvanas raised an eyebrow.

“Legitimate efforts, Nathanos,” she informed him, unable to keep the corner of her lip from twitching. “There are few enough answers to be gleaned. What happened is obvious enough; I merely wish it confirmed if possible. There is no need to risk a trail of deliberate obfuscation.”

Nathanos inclined his head. “Dark Lady.”

As he moved to walk away, Sylvanas raised her voice slightly to halt him in his tracks.

“Nathanos.” He turned, surprised and wary at the cold fury in her voice. “See that the other outposts know of this. He was surrounded; he was taunted past reason, he panicked, he was angry. Faced with the prospect of having his command taken, he chose to ignite his store and take the enemy with him. _ This is not acceptable. _”

He bowed. “I understand. Yet perhaps this may yet benefit us? The Kaldorei have grown bold. A reminder of the Horde’s strength, and the control we have over their lives—” 

_ “What _ control?” Sylvanas’ voice snapped like Northrend ice. “What _ control _ does it project when my own officers openly ignore my commands? When the threat of annihilation rests _ solely _ in my hands there is yet a way for the Kaldorei to avoid it. When Teldrassil can burn at any moment on the whim of any _ fool with flint and steel, _ there will be desperation. They will have nothing left to lose. Despair can only control a people so long as there is still _ hope! _”

Nathanos cringed, as did several Horde and Kaldorei officers within the nearest several hundred feet. With difficulty, Sylvanas restrained the cutting edge of the Banshee from her voice.

“Make it clear to our commanders.” Her voice still echoed, piercing, unnatural. “They will _ follow _ orders issued by their Warchief, to the letter; or the next time, death will not be enough to spare them.”

* * *

The First Arcanist of Suramar massaged her temples, counted slowly backward from ten thousand, and thanked every lucky star in the sky that her wife had found a hobby.

The Warchief wasn’t happy, per se, about Tyrande’s newfound sense of purpose; but she wasn’t _ disapproving, _ either. That had actually come as a surprise. Thalyssra had been dreading that first summons after giving the High Priestess her blessing, prepared to have to dig in her heels and defend her logic; but Sylvanas had made barely more than a few obligatory snide comments before letting the matter rest.

And so Tyrande was free to continue holding court in a modest chapel to Elune in the central city. 

Worship of the Goddess had...lapsed, among the shal’dorei. Ten thousand years without moonlight, without starlight or even the luxury of fresh air, with only the Nightwell to sustain them...there had seemed very little to keep faith in. The few who held to the old beliefs even in their exile were not mocked, exactly; even among Azshara’s loyalists the Goddess had been respected, and the Nightborne would not actively turn from her so boldly. But they were, at best, objects of vague pity.

That was beginning to change. There were many, especially among the very young and very old of Suramar, who now sought something deeper than the mere flow of mana with which to soothe their spirits. Who wished to remember the Goddess, but had no one remaining to teach them.

They were not the lost children Tyrande had intended to reach out to, when she woke one morning and abruptly informed Thalyssra that she was going to begin making regular trips into the city. Her plan, for which she had tersely requested access to a suitable meeting place since there were no true remaining temples to Elune in the city limits, had simply been to meet with the night elves trapped within Suramar and offer them some form of comfort.

At first, that was exactly what had happened. Thalyssra had no reason to deny her the right, and frankly wouldn’t have been willing to do so even if there _ had _been justification. But her meetings with the kaldorei in exile had expanded, and Thalyssra was...grateful. 

This was something of the old Empire that had been lost; and unlike most such things, it was an aspect of their culture that would do them all good to regain.

There were safeguards in place, of course. No more than ten individuals, not counting Tyrande, were allowed near the little chapel at one time; Valtrois was with her and listening carefully the vast majority of the time, or else one of the most trusted of the new Duskwatch. No messages or objects were permitted to be passed without going through the normal censorship channels, no weapons or magical foci were allowed within five hundred feet.

Tyrande had bristled when the limitations were laid out, but hadn’t pushed back.

And thank the Goddess for that, because it had kept her out of the Nighthold and distracted, which was the reason Thalyssra was still alive.

She’d barely been able to feign normalcy this morning long enough to see Tyrande off. She’d spent the past...she checked the time...thirty-six hours frantically fielding portal permissions, couriers, arcane messengers as well as rapid-fire updates through the normal Horde mail system.

The situation was under control for now, and there was an information lockdown in the Tree. But a fire of that size...word would get out, the smoke would have been visible for miles. The Horde still had control over Darkshore, but not Moonglade, and the Circle’s neutrality was a double-edged sword. Sometime very soon, the Alliance would have official confirmation of the blaze, and how that news got out would make all the difference in the world. And once the Alliance officially already knew, there was only so long Thalyssra could justify keeping it from—

Dusk-blue fingers whipped Thalyssra’s current report out of her hand.

Her strangled, undignified yelp was smothered by the hard rage in Tyrande’s eyes when Thalyssra spun around to face her.

“Tell me the situation in Teldrassil,” Tyrande ordered, before Thalyssra had a chance to even open her mouth. “Truthfully, and in full. _ Now.” _

Thalyssra raised her hands. “I don’t know what you’re—”

_ “Do not test my patience, First Arcanist!” _

“What gave you the impression there’s _ anything _to tell?”

Tyrande’s eyes flashed. In a priestess of Elune, that was more than a figure of speech. Thalyssra felt a wave of power wash over her, invisible for now like the wake of a passing shark in black water; a warning.

“There are no end of missives to which I expected an answer,” Tyrande said shortly. “Delaryn Summermoon has not written in three days; Shandris is overdue as well. No reports of any kind, from _ any _origin, have crossed my entirely metaphorical desk.”

“I _ did _offer you an actual—”

_ “Be silent.” _ It was a _ command, _ laced with divine magic, and Thalyssra’s words died in her throat against her will. “I am not alone. None of my people have heard from contacts in Darnassus. Friends and family cannot be raised. The druids hear rumors of smoke and the Sisterhood whispers of increased agitation and activity in the Horde. My attempts to contact the Alliance have met with such silence that I must assume either my letters or theirs are being withheld in blatant defiance of treaty law. _ What is the situation in Teldrassil?!” _

Thalyssra looked back at her, heart pounding but outwardly calm, and tapped two fingers against her own throat. Hissing in disgust, Tyrande swiped her hand through the air. The cold burn in Thalyssra’s vocal cords dissolved, and she cleared her throat to banish the sensation.

Able to speak again, she said evenly, “There was a fire near Dolanaar.”

Tyrande went still.

Since Tyrande going still was better than Tyrande going for a knife, Thalyssra carefully kept talking. “It’s been extinguished. There were no civilian casualties, thanks in large part to Horde firefighting efforts—”

A nearly feral snarl.

“—and a concentrated effort by Kaldorei huntresses and druids to evacuate nearby civilians,” Thalyssra finished hastily. “An orc commander in charge of a decoy Azerite charge detonated it without orders; the Warchief is as furious as I’ve ever seen her. Five Horde soldiers and eighteen Resistance fighters were killed in the explosion. A few buildings in Dolanaar were damaged, but the village stands and no other secondary fires have been detected.”

Tyrande was calmed slightly by having answers; but only very slightly.

“Take me to Darnassus,” she ordered.

Thalyssra flinched.

“I can’t do that—”

“My condolences for the unforeseen loss of your arcane abilities.” Venom dripped from Tyrande’s words. “Take me to Darnassus.”

“Tyrande.” Thalyssra stood carefully. “Be reasonable, I cannot simply—”

“Yes, you_ can.” _

“That is not something I can simply _ do _ unilaterally!” protested Thalyssra. “What would your presence even accomplish? The fires are under control, the wounded are being tended already!”

“It would accomplish my _ being there!” _ Tyrande cried. “If it were _ Suramar, _ you would allow yourself to be held elsewhere? They will be frustrated and confused even if not outright afraid!”

It wasn’t...the worst argument, frankly, which made it harder to argue against. “Tyrande, give—I need seventy-two hours.” Thalyssra forced herself to hold her hands relaxed and soft at her sides. “Let me speak to the Warchief and plant the seeds. I will do everything I can—”

Tyrande made a disgusted noise deep in her throat. “Oh, I am sure.”

“I_ can’t_ bring you to Darnassus without permission,” Thalyssra snapped. “That will be both our heads—”

“I think not.” Tyrnde’s retort was clipped. “Whatever you may think, I have never placed my pride above the needs of my people. My vengeance will wait; I have no intention of igniting a riot in an already delicate situation. If you claim the situation is under control, I have no choice but to believe you.” The words were obviously bitter on her tongue. “I wish to offer calm and reassurance. Even Sylvanas Windrunner is not so bloodthirsty as to throw her entire strategy away over an act with no negative consequences.”

Thalyssra arched an eyebrow. “And how much are you willing to stake on that?”

Tyrande’s smile had no warmth in it at all. “She will never grant you permission, no matter how cleverly you couch your words. But if I am already present, her hands will be tied against undue retribution. Better to ask forgiveness than permission, no?”

Thalyssra closed her eyes and continued counting backward from ten thousand, this time considerably faster.

There was a very good retort to this nonsense, and she would think of it any minute now.

“I hate you,” she said finally, holding out a hand. “And you’re going to get us both killed.”

“So be it,” Tyrande tossed back, and took her wrist in a grip like iron.

* * *

“...exactly _ seven seconds _ to explain yourself, First Arcanist.”

‘Seething’ did not begin to describe Sylvanas’ rage.

“There was no time to clear it, Warchief.” Thalyssra’s tone was _ infuriatingly _calm. “In the time I would have taken to arrange an audience and convince you of the idea, any benefit would have been squandered. It was important to the security of both the Horde and Alliance that she be seen—”

_ “Security.” _ Sylvanas’ voice could have splintered steel. “You would have me believe that you brought Tyrande Whisperwind—unguarded—to the heart of Darnassus, without my permission...to increase security.”

“Yes.”

She was good. Sylvanas had met enough liars in her time to appreciate a master at work. Thalyssra’s ears didn’t even twitch. The only tell that she was lying through her pretty fangs was the words coming from between them.

While Sylvanas sat for a moment drowning in the woman’s sheer gall, Thalyssra took advantage of her stay of execution.

“What _ benefit _ is there to keeping her away, Warchief?” She lowered her voice, taking a step forward as if that would get Sylvanas to think of them as on the same side of this argument. “The Kaldorei are rattled and confused. They’re in no state to launch a rebellion, and she’s not foolish enough to waste this opportunity. You said yourself you wanted to build a stable occupation—”

“The stability of this occupation,” Sylvanas hissed, “Rests in large part on keeping the High Priestess secure in Suramar. I asked_ one, small service of you.” _

Was she forever to be dogged by treachery in her ranks? Soft-hearted fools unable to tolerate the slightest discomfort in a single individual, willing to sacrifice hundreds or thousands of nameless strangers so long as their personal priorities were coddled...

“If I hadn’t opened a portal, she would have tried to escape.” Finally, some honesty. It stoked Sylvanas’ anger anew, but at least they were at the bones of it now. Thalyssra’s voice was flat, her ears pinned back. “Sylvanas, there were—”

“Forgive me, _ Thalyssra, _ but I was not aware we were on such intimate terms.”

Dark eyes narrowed. “Shall I curtsy as well, Dark Lady?” She stepped further into Sylvanas’ space, ignoring the flare of scarlet and the coiling shadows around them. Voice lowered, she hissed, “I brought her to the heart of a Horde-occupied city in which any violence breaking out would cause incalculable collateral damage to her own people. In doing so, I just gave you _ easily _ the best public opinion victory you’ve experienced since you pulled a dying Vol’jin onto your horse!”

Sylvanas bared her teeth, and this time even Thalyssra wasn’t fool enough to power through the threat display.

What _ galled _ her, what made her nearly breathe fire with how hot her rage burned, was that Thalyssra was _ right. _

The truth of the matter was, Whisperwind had made no attempt to escape and was unlikely to try it; Darnassus was heavily reinforced, as Thalyssra pointed out. Whisperwind hadn’t even protested the heavy Horde escort Saurfang had insisted on the moment he realized she was there. And she _ had _ restrained herself to walking the city streets, offering blessings and prayers with the Kaldorei. It was _ very _sweet, Sylvanas thought derisively. But, annoying as it might be to admit—the tension and uncertainty that had hung in the air like over-sweet perfume since the fire had all but vanished the moment the High Priestess appeared. 

It _ would _look good to the Alliance. The Horde, while taking precautions, had arranged to bring the High Priestess to Darnassus following an outbreak of unauthorized violence. It was an act of level-headed mercy. Good faith, even.

“She will be back in Suramar at least an hour before sundown.” The concession was acid in her mouth. Thalyssra nearly smiled, and shadows thrashed at Sylvanas’ back as she surged forward, backing the First Arcanist up half a step by reflex. 

_ Now _ Sylvanas allowed herself a cold smile.

“This will never happen again,” she murmured. 

Thalyssra’s ears quivered between fear and anger. 

Good.


End file.
